Single GrainSearch Engine Optimization and Pay Per Click Services in San Francisco2018-05-24T18:03:52Zhttps://www.singlegrain.com/feed/atom/Mostafa Elbermawyhttps://harver.com/http://www.singlegrain.com?p=16955&preview=true&preview_id=169552018-05-16T21:17:31Z2018-05-23T15:00:56Z

Branding today is so much more than just a logo, a color scheme, or an advertising campaign.

The concept has evolved and expanded like crazy over the past few decades and branding is now built on every single interaction between a customer and a business, both in-person and online. This puts businesses that are trying to push for more tech-driven actions in a unique position because it opens up far more opportunities to create a perception with audiences, whether positive or negative.

Artificial intelligence is also changing what it means to be a brand because it brings a whole new definition to human connection.

According to Salesforce’s State of Marketing Report, disclosed by Forbes, 53% of marketers plan to adopt Artificial Intelligence in the coming years which, in turn, will continue to diminish the amount of person-to-person interactions between a customer and a business. This means that the process of creating relationships with an audience will soon be the responsibility of a computer, rather than a sales or marketing team.

So how can brands still remain truly, authentically human while utilizing essential AI technology? Let’s discuss.

1) Let AI Build a Better Company Culture

No matter how many AI systems a company uses, it is still made up of the people within the business. And as long as there are people, there is going to be a culture within the company that is based on the personalities and practices in place.

A business’s culture can also greatly affect its branding persona with customers. Why do people look up to brands like Zappos, Google, and Southwest? It’s not just because of their wonderful products and services; these three industry leaders are also known for their exceptionally progressive internal cultures. This positive brand image makes these companies more attractive to both customers and job-seekers who want to join their teams.

Company culture plays a huge role in the success of a business; in fact, it’s thenumber one reason why employees leave a position. Many attribute this problem to a negative effect on their performance and overall experience.

On the other hand, businesses that prioritize culture are generally more productive and have higher revenues than their competitors, with30% higher engagement rates and significantly lower employee turnover. According to Growth Everywhere, “the likelihood of job turnover at an organization with high company culture is a mere 13.9 percent, whereas the probability of job turnover in low company cultures is 48.4 percent.”

Each new member of the team will have an effect on the culture as a whole, especially if they are in a position of leadership. Therefore, in order tobuild a world-class team, recruiters and hiring managers must be sure that every new hire is a positive addition to the company’s culture.

Additionally, a company with a good internal culture will actually attract better candidates, as65% value this during their job searches.

Well, Artificial Intelligence can help by building a better culture from the start. AI-driven recruiting systems like Harver (disclosure: the author of this post works for Harver) canautomate the pre-hiring process by qualifying candidates based on their potential culture fit and credentials. These types of AI-powered recruiting tools screen applications with specialized skill assessments to measure abilities, judgement and level of expertise. These tests can help identify personality traits and talents that will fit into the company culture, providing recruiters with the information they need for better hiring decisions.

For instance, in a highly collaborative office, communication skills, leadership capabilities and the ability to work well with others would all be necessary to possess. If the business’ culture is highly innovative, then it is important that any new addition has the creative thinking skills to keep up and be a positive asset to the team.

Traditional recruiting methods often fail to accurately assess these kinds of soft skills that are necessary for success. By incorporating AI-powered recruiting systems, hiring managers can rest assured that they have the data they need to understand where the candidate’s strengths and weaknesses lie.

AI tools can also be used within the company to measure and define the culture that currently exists. These systems use big data and machine learning technology to analyze cultural signals, such as engagement, employee sentiment and productivity levels, which, in turn, interprets the numbers into an accurate cultural description.

For example, some AI-powered systems collect data from communication tools, like Slack, along with surveys and questionnaires to accurately define employees’ current priorities. Managers and leaders can then create anideal internal culture, and the system can help create a roadmap for strategies to guide the company in that direction, while machine learning technology tracks progression along the way.

2) Let AI Connect You with the Right Audience

The key to building asuccessful brand that stands out from the competition is connecting with your audience on a personal level. Branding is about creating relationships by understanding who exactly the audience is, and what they want.

In order to build these powerful emotions between you and your customers, you must first know who you are trying to connect with. Many marketing teams turn to audience analytics to determine the demographics of their customers. However, these assessments are not always accurate, especially if your marketing team is measuring the wrong data points. Failing to identify an important demographic or niche of potential customers through ineffective audience analysis is a missed opportunity that many businesses cannot afford.

AI technology can help marketers collect and analyze loads of consumer data, giving teams access to accurate information in order to drive their marketing strategies. By using machine-learning technology, these systems gather historical consumer information and translate it into comprehensive datasets for more accurate audience insights.

Machine-learning systems are able to analyze thousands of data points for highly accurate, behavior-driven evaluations. For instance, information gathered fromdata-driven POS systems or webpage tracking gives marketing teams insight into the kinds of products that are frequently purchased or viewed by specific customers.

The data from these reports can then be used to create highly personalized customer interactions, including better recommendations and unique offers for a more engaging shopping experience. Personalization is extremely important to today’s consumer, and59% of customers state that it has a major influence on their decision to purchase from a company.

Data-driven systems can also provide marketing teams with the exact information they need for more precise targeting parameters based on demographic and geographic data. Orangetheory Fitness began to useAI-powered marketing for hyper-targeted advertising to offer a free workout to customers within a specific location of one of their studios. They also used machine-learning technology to determine the characteristics of their best converting clients (in this case, women who live 3-5 miles from a studio). Then they targeted consumers who fit into that category through social media advertising.

As a result, their company has quadrupled in size in just three years and they are on track to hit $1 billion in revenue by the end of 2018.

AI-based analytical systems track the responses from your audience to measure their sentiment and even predict future reactions. You can then drill down your audience’s most common points of sentiment, see how their needs change over time, and adjust your content marketing strategy accordingly.

Businesses can improve their branding strategies by simply understanding their audience on a deeper level. Knowing who your ideal customer is, what they value, and what they want or need from your company is the kind of information that is needed to build a brand that cares about their audience.

3) Let AI Fuel Customer Conversations

One of the greatest benefits that AI has to offer is the ability to automate much of the sales process. When customers contact a business online, they expect a near immediate response, a task that is simply not feasible for many companies. However, AI chatbots can be quite helpful when it comes to answering FAQs, offering sales suggestions, or directing a customer where to go next.

Customer service is the most important element of a positive customer experience, and45% of consumers agree that they would be willing to pay more for better service from a company.

By implementing AI-powered chatbots into your business’s customer service toolset, common inquiries can be answered through automated live chat, rather than having customers call in and wait on hold for an available representative. Plus, thanks to the power of machine-learning technology, these chatbots can improve over time by gathering feedback from each customer interaction.

AI chatbots also make a great addition to your sales team. By gathering consumer data, chatbots can suggest items that may interest customers based on their preferences and shopping history.

For example, Sephora launched a personal assistant chatbot that invites shoppers to take a quick quiz so that they can create personalized shopping suggestions for them. The chatbot also offers reviews and tips for each product that is searched for by the customer for a more interactive shopping experience.

While AI technology is certainly on its way to developing human-like logic, it cannot experience emotions like empathy or excitement on its own (at least not yet), both of which are important for building relationships with customers. Therefore, the messaging and overall “personality” of the bot must be properly programmed with the company’s brand in mind. Just like a new customer service rep must be trained on the proper language to use with a customer, chatbots must be programmed with the right responses for various inquiries and issues.

Quality assurance is also critical for chatbot success. If a chatbot is unable to accurately answer customer questions and concerns, it will result in frustration and can hurt overall branding efforts. Chatbot analytical systems can be used to track these interactions and identify any issues or miscommunications that need to be addressed.

The use of this technology can help improve a company’s image because it allows businesses to instantly engage with customers at any time. Positive customer service interactions are the key to building better brand association. Whether it is a response to a Tweet, a comment, or a direct message conversation, AI-powered bots can offer advice or resolve issues, and even make sales, in turn showing customers that they are reliable and engaging.

In Conclusion

Consumers are more connected with brands than ever these days, thanks to social media and the increasing popularity of online shopping, so building a positive brand with customers is absolutely essential for company growth. AI technology can provide businesses with the exact tools they need in order to take advantage of these opportunities and build stronger customer relationships with every interaction.

By using AI to build a better internal culture, companies can expect better external results. These types of recruiting tools help to identify stronger culture fits and better talent that will build a stronger business from the start. Businesses can rest assured that they know exactly who their customers are thanks to deep, data-based technology that identifies ideal customers. And finally, they will also be able to connect instantly with customers by using chatbots to engage in helpful conversations.

There is no denying that artificial intelligence will soon be involved in nearly every aspect of business – in some form or another. Thankfully, using this technology will only help brands maintain or grow a more positive image with their audience through more precise and personalized actions.

No matter what your business is, you want to stay one step ahead of your competitors and boost sales.

But the days when you could simply launch an advertising campaign to attract new customers are long gone. Traditional online advertising doesn’t work anymore: according to HubSpot, 64% of people who use an ad blocker do so because they find ads annoying.

Customers are overwhelmed with the amount of branded information they receive daily, so it’s important to find alternative ways to promote your product. Thus, you should keep an eye on marketing trends to deliver the brand message.

The solution? Ephemeral content! Even though this type of content disappears in 24 hours, it has become a powerful marketing strategy.

These days, many social media platforms (Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram) offer an opportunity to share impermanent content. However, Instagram has become the main platform for its creation – from stories to live stream, users can create various kinds of transient content, and they like it!

Instagram short-lived content has become more and more popular among users. Within just a year of the launch, Instagram Stories hit 250 million daily active users(and gained 50 million users in just two months!), surpassing its original Snapchat version:

Keep in mind that on Instagram:

75% of users take action (visit website, search, shop) after seeing a post

Why Do Instagrammers Love Ephemeral Content?

Even without realizing it, users are uploading short-lived content every day, and the main reasons are:

Share day-to-day life moments without spamming followers

Interact with friends in a genuine way

Understand who viewed your stories

As Instagrammers have grown to love ephemeral content, this has become a significant strategy for marketers. If you wonder why investing time and money in content that has an expiry date is worth giving it a try, pay attention to this list of benefits that ephemeral content offers businesses:

It helps beat the Instagram algorithm. In March 2016, Instagram changed its algorithm, pivoting away from the chronological order. The app shows users relevant content they may find more interesting. It’s estimated that only 10% of your audience is actually seeing your posts and although that means trouble for marketers, ephemeral content helps your get seen because it appears in a separate, in-app feed and won’t get buried in the news feed.

It helps leverage inherent urgency. Ephemeral content lasts for 24 hours only, so it provides an FOMO (fear of missing out) effect: people watch Instagram stories and join live streams because they don’t want to miss something important.

It helps you avoid over-posting. The best part about ephemeral content is that it allows people to share a lot without creating over-posting fatigue for your followers. Marketers can share things like behind-the-scenes moments and other soft-sell stories, and the short-lived content helps your brand stay fresh.

For these reasons, ephemeral content helps marketers make the most out of social media marketing. Want to know the best part? Ephemeral content can be a key to turning Instagram followers into paying customers, and help bring your business to the new level.

Here are some ways you can use ephemeral content to turn followers into customers on Instagram:

Instagram Stories

More and more Instagrammers upload and watch stories daily. Because Instagram Stories disappear after 24 hours, people have become less picky about this content as it won’t appear on the profile grid.

First things first: Why should companies care about investing a large amount of time on content that will disappear?

Although they last only 24 hours, Instagram stories have many benefits. In fact, they have encouraged users to spend more time watching content, thus increasing the amount of time on the platform to 32 minutes a day if you’re under 25 years of age and 24 minutes a day for those over 25.

While it’s easy to miss a post from a follower, you’re less likely to miss Instagram stories that pop up at the top of your Instagram feed surrounded by a pink/yellow circle. Therefore, Instagrammers watch stories more often than scrolling through the main feed.

This is a good way to beat the Instagram algorithm and deliver your brand message. For example, you can promote your product/service or show behind-the-scenes moments without annoying followers. Moreover, by adding location tags, your story can attract new potential customers who are interested in your geographical location.

When it comes to online shopping, customers can’t touch and feel the product. However, brands can show off their products from different angles to make customers feel comfortable. For example, Whole Foods adds several stories to display their products’ features:

If you stay creative, you can showcase specific details about one product which may increase brand trust. Stories can also lead to impulse shopping as customers are afraid of missing out something important. As specified in the CreditCards poll:

5 out of 6 Americans admit to making impulse buys. So the easier the checkout process is, the more likely your followers will purchase.Click To Tweet

Thus, you need to do your best to help potential customers find out more about your product. The trick is to add clickable story links.

To begin with, numbers matter. To get a link feature in your IG story, you need to have at least 10k followers on your business account. Once your following is big enough, you can add story links, and therefore get more website visitors.

This will not only drive more Instagram traffic to your website, but can turn your followers into customers. Because Instagram stories are only up to 15 seconds long, Instagrammers have to decide fast whether they want to visit your website. For instance, J.Crew takes advantage of the impulse buy trigger and uses the disappearing format to drive people to a purchase page.

Stories Highlights

At the end of last year, Instagram rolled out a new feature called Stories Highlights that allows users to save and keep stories for more than 24 hours. It gives an opportunity for marketers to combine different stories into albums and make ephemeral content long-term so that your audience can view it whenever they want to. And it is you who chooses which stories to save and display under your bio.

Every time you upload Instagram Stories, they are automatically saved to your Archive unless you want to delete them. Then you can select which stories you want to add to Stories Highlights and make them appear on your profile. You can create albums and group stories the way you want, which is beneficial for businesses.

Although users like watching Instagram stories, they may miss something important. When you create Stories Highlights, you allow your followers and visitors to learn more about your brand. Because Stories Highlights appear on the top of your profile, Instagrammers don’t need to scroll endlessly through your feed to find something that may interest them: all your products and offers are in one place.

Let’s take a look at Sephora. This brand uses Stories Highlights to show off their products. For example, if you want to learn more about foundations they offer, you can tap on the highlight and see all offers. Plus, they add a clickable link which makes it faster to see the descriptions and prices.

Live Stream

Live stream is a proven way to connect with followers in an authentic way.

Video has become a crucial feature of the social media experience and according to Livestream, 82% of people prefer live video from a brand over social posts. Video marketing is booming and Instagram Live is a trend that attracts many users as it offers urgent, interactive, and unique content.

For brands, it provides many marketing opportunities because you can show off your product in a way that speaks to your followers and hook potential buyers.

What can you live stream?

Product launch:If your Instagram followers are interested in your brand, it’s likely that they will love the idea of being the first to see your new release. Moreover, offering an exclusive discount for viewers is a perfect way to build buzz around your new product and boost sales.

Behind-the-scenes moments:When you take your followers behind the scenes, you humanize your company. No matter what type of “backstage” content you create (team building, progress, funny or personal), it’s a great way to nurture a deep connection with your followers and gain trust.

Showcase events:Integrating online and offline events helps followers experience the occasion. When you include your customers in your events, even if virtually, you build loyalty to your brand.

Online tutorials:Vlogging has become more and more popular, and online tutorials are among the most-viewed content. When you broadcast a tutorial or webinar, you give your followers something useful, and as an expert in the niche, you know better than anyone what you can teach people.

Q&As:On the Internet, customers can’t touch a product before they buy it, so they might have a lot of questions. When you organize Q&As sessions, you encourage potential customers to ask whatever they want about your product, and therefore show that you care by helping them out.

Another good thing is that you can go live with a guest which means collaborating with influential people to gain trust. The power of influencer marketing is booming, so you can find influencers on Instagram to join you while you’re broadcasting.

When you invite an influencer to live stream with you, it helps your followers engage with a reputable thought leader. Collaborative live streams help show the human side of your company and build a connection between brands, influencers, and customers.

When you go live, you invest in relationships with your audience, which helps you come across as an authentic brand. Thus, it allows you to turn followers into customers, especially if you provide viewers with time-sensitive offers that help them get your product with a discount.

The Sum Up

Here is a list of key takeaways from this article that can help you turn Instagram followers into customers with ephemeral content:

Post regularly. Ephemeral content disappears within 24 hours, so don’t be afraid of overposting. While there’s no perfect formula on how many times to post Instagram stories, Neil Patel claims that posting frequency is not all that important for your Instagram marketing. Instead, what you should focus on is consistency and quality.

Bring value. Instagram rolls out handy features that help marketers make the most out of ephemeral content (Stories Highlights, clickable links, etc.). Thus, when posting ephemeral content, think about the value you can offer your followers. It’s a good idea to show off your product from different angles (and always use high-quality images), grouped into specific albums, or with live stream video.

Humanize your brand. Taking your followers behind the scenes to let them see the real you helps you build brand trust. A person who trusts and likes a company is a loyal customer and brand advocate.

Ephemeral content is not just a buzzworthy trend; it’s a powerful method that helps to turn Instagram followers into customers.

Online advertising can sometimes feel a whole lot like playing Plinko, the popular mini-game featured on The Price Is Right. You drop a ball into a board pock-marked with pins and hope it lands where you want it.

In other words, advertising online is complicated; you do research, determine your target audience, create a quality ad, and release it to the world, to be clicked or ignored.

Your ad could bounce off one pin and then another, landing in front of a completely difference audience than the one you intended. Fortunately, there are things you can do to increase your odds in the advertising space.

Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is an excellent answer to the Plinko-style advertising problem.

PPC traffic is 50% more likely to make a purchase than organic traffic

Search ads have the capacity to increase brand awareness by 80%

The average click-through rate (CTR) for a first-position ad is almost 8%

The Future of PPC in a Nutshell

PPC advertising is an incredible way to draw valuable traffic to your product or service — that’s why the practice is growing at a large rate. Its cost effective nature, propensity to provide higher product sales, and ability to offer marketing insights make PPC advertising the perfect system on which to launch or boost a business.

However, the next few years of online marketing are going to be completely different from what you’ve experienced in the past. Winterberry Group reports that digital ad spend is likely to surpass that of traditional advertising in 2018. Additionally, the faster the Internet gets, the less patient its users grow — in 2010, a page that loaded in six seconds would experience a 40% conversion loss, while that same loading experience results in a 50% conversion loss today.

If you are going to make it in online advertising, you have to take into account some outside factors that will play a role in the future, potentially changing online and PPC advertising as we know and love them.

It is absolutely vital for every marketing team to track the potential changes and trends in PPC. I spoke with Burton Hohman, Paid Search Manager at Best Company, about the importance of staying up-to-date:

“Paid search is incredibly important to our business and staying on top of the changes the channels like Google & Facebook make is crucial. However, not every change always works out for the better. We’ve seen both positive and negative impacts so testing new strategies is an essential step before adapting to the latest trend.”

Before you can test, you need to make efforts to anticipate the changes to come. Be on the lookout for these six trends to affect PPC in the near future:

1) The Downside of Growth

The first trend you have to be aware of is not necessarily a bad one, but it does call for some concern among those bidding for keywords. PPC is becoming hugely popular, which means that you will be bidding against not only more advertisers, but also against more quality advertising.

This isn’t the first time a boost in PPC popularity has become an issue. In the results from respective surveys in both 2011 and 2012, PPC effectiveness was trending down. The year-to-year comparison saw a 4.8% drop in marketers who identified PPC as having the biggest impact on lead generation and 9.3% of marketers said they would decrease spending on PPC the following year.

The downtrend also saw the arrival of hundreds of ‘PPC is Dead’ articles — the sentiment toward PPC in those days was terrible. However, once marketers started realizing that a lack of keyword research, irrelevant ads, and an abysmal lack of attention to ad copy actually affected lead generation, PPC began to hit its stride once again.

What disgruntled marketers didn’t realize back in 2012 was that greater competition leads to a greater need for quality content. Obviously, you against 10 competitors will likely result in a greater ROI than bidding against 1,000 competitors, so when PPC was becoming popular the slackers lost big.

When the number of competitors increases, your ability to stand out entirely depends on maintaining, refining, and growing your PPC skillset.Click To Tweet

The increase in competition will also likely bring along with it higher prices on keywords, as competition will push the ceiling on the most popular keywords — your proficiency at picking the right long-tail keywords will become ever more important in the days ahead.

2) More Reputable PPC Networks

A positive side of the growing Pay-Per-Click popularity is that PPC real estate is growing as well. The burgeoning tech industry is creating new channels for future ad spaces.

Google’s domination of the PPC advertising space seems to be limitless, but Google has never gone unchallenged in other industries, so why should PPC be any different? The future of pay-per-search will certainly see more competition between the big four tech giants (Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Apple).

Facebook alone has acquired 66 companies to date and doesn’t seem to be slowing down. As of December 2017, 18% of global online ad revenue is earned by Facebook.com, which means that Facebook has a lot of room to grow in the ad space beyond its social media platform. For example, Facebook owns Instagram, which is ready to move its messaging system to a different app, a move that led to expanded ads in Facebook Messenger.

Up to this point, Google has largely reigned supreme in the PPC service space. However, other large companies are planning on making waves in the PPC service industry, which will make things much more interesting.

Rumors suggest that Amazon will make a push in the ad space and is set to announce a game-changing, programmatic ad structure that makes buying ads 'as easy as filling up an online shopping cart.'Click To Tweet

An Amazon-Google PPC rivalry could only be a good thing for online advertisers as it will spur the need for innovation and breadth of new PPC services.

Speaking with “people familiar with the matter” and under the guise of anonymity (due to the plan’s lack of an official announcement), Sloane reveals that “even Google is building for Amazon’s ad platform” and that “Google’s DoubleClick supports buying search ads on Microsoft Bing and Yahoo, and it’s developing the same capability for Amazon.” Though Google’s PPC system has a commanding presence in the PPC industry, you will want to keep an eye out for competition.

As companies like Facebook and Amazon rev up their PPC efforts, you will likely find even more opportunities for quality PPC growth in other popular spaces on the web.

The near future will bring a push “on two fronts: unleashing the intelligence of audience management and making strides with voice search. Other challenges – multi-channel attribution, smart bidding automation, and cross-device analytics – will remain. However, I believe that audience management and voice search will open up even greater frontiers for success.”

Karen Chen at Online Optimism recently considered the value of voice search in the future, saying:

“First off, voice searches are longer. Instead of the average 3-5 keywords searched, voice searches usually consist of entire sentences containing 10 or more words. These sentences usually begin with who, what, where, why, and how. These terms give insight on the searcher’s intent, which allows Google to give more personalized and relevant search results. Voice search leads to another huge trend in PPC, Artificial Intelligence.”

It’s not a stretch to say that once voice and visual search become a part of day-to-day PPC procedures, more advanced tech, like AI, isn’t too far behind.

Marketers with eyes toward the future should consider running a PPC-based voice search test. Those who choose to prepare for the inevitable popularity (and possibly preference of) voice search will need to adjust keyword focus, as voice search results in different queries, such as:

4) Blocking Bad Ads

Hopefully this won’t come as a surprise to you, but potential customers and casual web browsers don’t like bad, or even average, ads. For a customer to click on an ad, it must be exceptional. That’s why Google is getting smarter about which ads it allows on Chrome:

In Chrome 64, Google cracked down on flashy ads and auto-play videos that pop up without warning, which led to a decrease of annoying ads appearing for Chrome users. For its Chrome 66 update, Google is boosting its ‘annoying ad filter,’ by allowing Chrome to learn which sites you like hearing sound on and which you would prefer were muted. So, how does this affect you as a PPC advertiser?

Well, if you’ve been using the better PPC networks, like Facebook and Google, you won’t have a problem — at least, not much of a problem. The lesser-known PPC networks will be hit the hardest by Google’s new changes.

This impact on less-reputable networks will likely lead to a greater amount of traffic on Google and Facebook’s PPC networks, leading to even more competition for PPC advertisers like you.

5) Structured Data

Google’s mobile-first index has officially been rolled out. If you haven’t been keeping up with this news, the mobile-first index means that Google will be looking at the quality of your mobile platform and content before looking at your desktop quality.

“I would not be surprised in 2018 to see Google pulling more information into ads dynamically from landing page copy, images and schema markup, as well as sources like Google Manufacturer Center. And of course, Google isn’t the only platform relying on feeds and other structured data sources to power ad campaigns.”

Even though the mobile-first index affects SEO much more than PPC, it can still make a difference, since users are greatly influenced by things like landing page experience and bounce rate. If your mobile platform doesn’t perform well or the content isn’t optimized, your ad could be penalized, resulting in higher a higher ad price and a lower quality score.

6) A Wealth of New Keywords

One trend that seems to be perpetually relevant is the birth of new keywords. New products mean new keywords, and new products are being created every single day. Some of those products will explode in popularity and could have a huge impact on your PPC advertising, depending on which set of keywords you target.

Take the word “blockchain” for example, which meant practically nothing a few years ago. Now the keyword “blockchain” could have an impact on some huge industries, drastically affecting your keyword selection.

Your ability to predict trending and future-trending keywords will become insanely valuable to your company.Click To Tweet

Boost your keyword research efforts — it is absolutely imperative that you identify those hard-to-find long-tail keywords with the influx of new competition in the coming days. Though the introduction of thousands of new keywords will certainly help you in your mission to creating the perfect PPC campaign, you don’t want to be left behind when other big names step into the PPC game.

Conclusion

In order to increase your chances at winning the PPC version of Plinko, wouldn’t it be interesting to pull out some of the “pins” that block the path between you and your target audience? Fortunately, the future of pay-per-click advertising is bright and the most prepared advertisers will be the first to benefit.

Plan ahead to make smarter moves and consumer-tailored ad campaigns, because when Amazon and Facebook make their respective moves, you’ll want to be ahead of the oncoming curve.

UPDATED! One of our most popular posts in 2017, this ultimate guide to SEO techniques that grow rankings has been updated to get you ready for a successful 2018!

In today’s rapidly shifting world, SEO techniques can change on a dime—and the worst part is that you might not even know it. Hacks that could have won you a front-page result as recently as 2016 are not only obsolete now, but they may even hurt your website’s rankings.

That’s why you need to stay on top of the ball.

We spoke with Jacob Warwick, Director of Communications at Skedulo, and Jesse Teske, SEO Manager at YLighting, to get their expert thoughts on the most current SEO tactics. In this post, we’ve broken down the top SEO techniques to help you skyrocket your rankings and boost your number of monthly visitors.

Before we learn about improving your web page ranking, let’s take some time to test your current page ranking on search engine results.

Here is a free tool offered by SERPS, that you can use to determine your page ranking based on keyword search. Take some time to explore the tools and other multiple search criteria they have to offer like domain name, location and device type.

Your goal is to make the results list here and then get closer to the top of this list. Run this test to check your site ranking in the eyes of Google and Yahoo, and master the following techniques to improve upon that rank.

1. Improve Engagement to Improve Rankings

Simply put, engagement is the ability to hold a user’s attention. In SEO terms, it is a measure of the amount of time spent on a page.

Although Google hasn’t officially declared it, there is evidence to suggest that this search engine giant does reward sites with strong user engagement with higher page ranking.

According to research done by Wordstream, there’s a definite correlation between the bounce rate of a page and its organic position. The higher a web page’s bounce rate is, the lower it’s ranked in search.

Google’s reasoning is that if a user spends more time on a page, it’s probably because she found the page useful. And since Google only wants to deliver the best possible results to its users, it will push sites with strong engagement up in the search engine results pages (SERPs).

So how can you improve your site’s engagement?

Here are five tactics you can use to give your existing content a boost in search engines:

A) Format Your Posts for Easier Reading

Good formatting can instantly improve your page’s readability. This, in turn, can improve your engagement rate. According toeye-tracking studies, the following three formatting tactics can help increase your content readability:

Shorter paragraphs: Limit each paragraph to 2-3 sentences at most. It’s even okay to use one-sentence paragraphs if necessary, but use them sparingly or your post will look like a bullet-pointed blog without the bullets.

Sub-headers: People don’t read on the web; they scan. To make scanning easier, use plenty of clear and informative sub-headers to guide readers down a page. In addition to this, call out points that are important by emphasizing them in bold. Readers should be able to scan your blog post and get the “gist” of what you’re talking about.

Bullet points: When you have a lot of data — stats, facts, ideas, examples — packed into one paragraph (like this one!), it makes it easier to scan when you list them with bullet points.

Here’s an example of poor formatting:

Knowledge of the existence of the Law of Attraction is a huge benefit in itself. Most people live their entire life and never realize that there thoughts are creating their reality. When one discovers this universal truth the entire world begins to open up. After much hard work and practice you will begin to see life-changing and long -lasting results from utilizing the techniques and strategies taught here. There are many ways to use the law including through daily affirmations, visualizations, goal setting, changing think patterns and of course tapping into the universal storehouse of information.

Most people live their entire lives and never realize that their thoughts are creating their reality.

After much hard work and practice you will begin to see life-changing and long -lasting results from utilizing the techniques and strategies taught here.

Here are some ways you can use the law of Attraction to your benefit:

Daily affirmations

Visualizations

Goal settings

Changing link patterns

B) Use Bucket Brigades

A “bucket brigade” is a copywriting technique designed to keep capture a reader’s interest and keep them on your page.

It essentially involves breaking an idea into multiple sentences, using a trigger word or phrase (as simple as “Look.” Or as lengthy as “The secret to great copywriting is this”) and then ending the sentence with a colon.

C) Use Images Throughout Your Content

Including professional, high-quality images (photos, graphs) throughout your content is an easy yet powerful way to increase engagement. For one, images help you show an idea, not just tell it (a picture tells a thousand words, right?).

Secondly, images help you break content into different sections. And finally, people just like pretty pictures.

D) Write in the Inverted Pyramid Style

This method means giving away the most valuable information at the top of the article, and following it up with less important information. If readers tend to scan and rarely make it to the bottom of an article, it makes sense to give them what they want as soon as they land on the page.

E) Improve Your Bounce Rate

Writing well, delivering value, and proper formatting only go so far. Another key part of engagement is lowering your bounce rate, which is the percentage of visitors who land on your website and leave without interacting further.

Bounce rates can be raised by a number of factors, from incorrect implementation to poorly designed landing pages.

More often than not, however, high bounce rates result from poor usability and an awkward user experience (UX). While these problems vary from site to site, they are very easily remedied with several popular online tools, such as:

Crazy Egg – Clever and intuitive, Crazy Egg helps subscribers rate and understand user experience with their rich visual aids like heatmaps, scrollmaps, confetti, and overlays.Each of these are graphic representations of one aspect of UX.

For instance, heat maps are colorful representations of where users have clicked on your site, while scrollmaps show you just how far down the page your users scroll before leaving.

With this data, it’s possible to figure out what your best design features (or flaws) are, and correct them accordingly. On Crazy Egg’s home page, they’ve included an example of a heatmap of their site which shows where their visitors clicked:

In A/B testing, multiple versions of a web page are randomly shown to users, compared against a control page (generally the existing website), and then analyzed for effect.

The biggest advantage of a proper A/B testing process is that marketers can understand how even the tiniest changes can positively affect their website, such as moving the buy button to the left or changing its color from red to blue.

In this case, users needed to understand the benefits of signing up before they were ready to submit their email address. Placing the CTA at the bottom let users get a sense for the value of the service first.

The genius of Optimizely is that it massively simplifies something that would otherwise require a team of dedicated, experienced UX designers and researchers to carry out.

Google Optimize – Along the same lines, Optimize by Google Analytics also assists marketers in improving and maximizing customer engagement and conversion. As a free version of its Optimize 360 program, Google’s Optimize is a streamlined, user-friendly software that simplifies A/B testing and includes advanced modeling to improve engagement and targeted experiences.

But perhaps the biggest draw of Optimize is that it seamlessly integrates with Google Analytics, allowing marketers to further leverage their existing resources.

User Testing – While Google Optimize and Optimizely are essentially DIY UX tools for marketers and small business owners, User Testing is far more specialized. In its most basic form, User Testing is more of a pure research tool, gathering commentary from target audiences and offering marketers detailed videos of user interaction and behavior.

User Testing customers have the option of capturing and understanding meaningful interactions with their product. New features make it easier to extract and highlight customer intelligence.

Don’t Make Me Think – These four tools are some of the best UX testing programs available today. Yet one of the best UX resources isn’t digital, but rather a book: Don’t Make Me Think, a groundbreaking work by UX designer Steve Krug that has sold 100,000 copies over 5 years.Witty, entertaining and down-to-earth, Don’t Make Me Think offers actionable advice and useful mindsets for novices and veterans alike.

With its conversational tone and engaging manner, Krug’s work gets readers into the habit of critically examining and rethinking everything about their websites, including even the tiniest details, like misplaced buttons or unwieldy site maps.

Google Search Console – Click-through rates, or how often viewers click on your ads after seeing them, are some of the most important metrics of success and failure. A high CTR reflects positively on your content and advertising, and in turn widens your funnel for more prospects to enter, engage with your brand and content, and ultimately close, be it in the form of purchases or subscriptions.

Luckily, there are programs like Google Search Console and Tableau, which allow marketers to identify critical keywords which are performing (or underperforming) for their position, understand why and, most importantly, quickly visualize the terms and pages to target. With these programs, marketers can turn around underperforming terms by rewriting titles and descriptions, thereby increasing CTR and drumming up traffic.

ClickFlow – ClickFlow is a tool we built to help companies increase organic traffic without more backlinks or posting more content. Through ClickFlow, companies can automatically see which pages on their site have the most potential to grow revenues – such as pages that have high impression count in search but a low click through rate. Using that information, ClickFlow will keep track of headline tests to help grow your click throughs from search terms you already rank for. The tool drives up your bottom line by showing you how much revenue you’ve gained and how much you stand to gain. It’s been used by companies like LeadPages, Drip, The Atlantic, and more.

2. Make Your Existing Pages Longer

A recent study by Backlinko concluded that the longer the content, thehigher the likelihood of it ranking at the top of the SERPs.

However, writing 2,000+ words for every blog post is not for everyone; it’s an intensive, time-consuming process. Instead, it’s much easier to take a page from 1,200 words to 2,000 words than to go from 0 words to 2,000 words.

Existing content already has authority and an established readership. So rather than writing something entirely from scratch, it’s much simpler to find a post of yours that is already doing well on Google, refresh it with updated information and extra content, and rely on existing signals to make it rank for terms.

Here’s how you do it. First, under “Search Traffic” in Google Search Console, click on “Search Analytics.”

On this page, check “Position” and select “Pages”:

Try to find pages that are ranking between positions 11-30 on Google. These are ideal candidates for additional content that can increase their rankings.

A) Make Your Video SEO Friendly

The filename, the title, the description—all these elements affect your rankings.

Video Title – Crafting a compelling video title is a balancing act—you have to make the title SEO friendly and make it clickable. Ideally, you should follow the same convention in your video titles as you would in your blog posts: to get clicks and shares, include keywords as well as power words.

Here’s a great example:

Another tactic is to use your keywords at the start of the title, then add a sub-header after a colon to drive clicks. Here’s an example:

At the very least, your title should have 5+ words and include a broad target keyword. This will not only help you rank in SERPs but also get you more clicks on YouTube.

Video Description – Because Google’s spiders can’t “read” videos, they will rely on your written description to determine what your video is actually about. So instead of just throwing in some target keywords, try creating short blog posts that describe your video content in detail.

C) Use Better Video Thumbnails

A better video thumbnail won’t necessarily help with your SEO, but like a great headline, it will help you get more clicks. This means that you can often earn more views than higher ranked results, all thanks to your choice of thumbnail.

A strong thumbnail should tell viewers exactly what the video is about. Try to use a compelling image along with a title card. Here’s an example:

4. Improve Site Speed

Back in 2010, Google announced that it would be using site speed as a ranking factor and since then, Google has consistently emphasized the importance of site speed.

Recently, it launched another tool called Think with Google to help gauge how responsive (or mobile-friendly) a site is, which includes speed as a parameter.

Clearly, Google wants your website to load faster than it is right now.But how fast?

Unfortunately, the exact definition of “site speed” is open to speculation. According to the surveys done by Akamai and Gomez, nearly half of web users expect a site to load in 2 seconds or less. If the site fails to launch in 3 seconds, there is a good chance they’ll abandon it.

For non-WordPress sites, browser caching is a little trickier. One quick way to do it is to change your .htaccess file. Follow the instructions here to learn how to do this.

C) Content Delivery Network

A CDN is a network of servers based throughout the globe. When visitors access your website, they are delivered the site from a server that is as close to their physical location as possible, thereby improving site speed.

Using a CDN is a easy fix to instantly improve site speed and will have an immediate impact on site performance.

A quicker way to improve your page performance is by using browser add-ins like YSlow to determine the exact bottlenecks and propose respective fixes.

This tool will help you monitor your website and list all the factors that are dragging down the site’s speed. They also suggest best practices to follow to achieve the same. The best part is the suggested fixes are described in non-technical language which can be comprehended by anyone.

Here are some more technical changes you can make to further improve your site load speed:

Load JavaScripts at the Bottom: Take those script tags you see in any javascript webpage, and move them to the end of the page. You’ll see a significant improvement in page load performance. This is one of Google’s crucial performance metrics when displaying search results.

Lazy load images – This change will reduce the page load time drastically. Lazy loading basically avoiding to load all images on initial page load. In other words, load them after the user scrolls to that section of the page. Here’s a tutorial that lists a bunch of ways you can modify your images to save your bandwidth.

5. Focus on Topics Instead of Keywords

Google is evolving and so is its algorithm. Its objective now is to understand the intention of the users: what users expect, what they are looking for, and more specifically, what search results would best help answer their query.

Plus, for an increasingly large number of queries (22.6% of queries in 2014, 31.2% in 2015, and 40% in 2016), Google shows “rich results” that include the best answer at the top of the results:

In short, you must consider what your users are looking for rather than coming up with different ways that users can phrase a search query. Here are two things in particular you should consider:

A) Know Your Target Audience

What kind of content you’ll create will depend on your audience. The better you know them—their location, age, and likes—the better the content you’ll create (and the better your SEO).

For example, suppose your keyword tool shows that “android” has a lot of search volume. People searching for it could fall into several categories:

Mobile users searching for Android help

Star Wars fans looking for droids

Robotics enthusiasts looking for information about androids

Without knowing your target audience, you might end up creating content for all these topics, which would win you neither readers nor good rankings. By building a detailed buyer persona, you’ll be better able to zero in on topics that matter to your readers.

B) Organize Content into “Themes”

Instead of focusing on standalone keywords, organize all your content into different “themes.”

For example, if you run a website about WordPress, you might have three types of readers:

Casual bloggers who are taking the first steps with using WordPress

Experienced users who want to learn WordPress tips and tricks

Entrepreneurs who want to use WordPress to build their businesses

To target each of these types of readers, you can organize your content into different themes that cover multiple topics, such as:

How to Use WordPress for Business (topics: WordPress marketing plugins, marketing advice, etc.)

This is far more reader-friendly than simply creating content for specific keywords.

C) Research Keywords—and Use Them Sparingly

At the same time—keywords still matter. Organizing content thematically is very important, but it’s a mistake to ignore keywords entirely, given that they serve as signposts to Google’s spiders, signaling topics and giving hints as to the nature of the content on the website.

Luckily, there are a number of tricks and tools that can help marketers find topics and volume data. Google itself is a good way to get related search ideas. Just type “sushi restaurants in San Francisco” into the search bar of Google Chrome and you’ll be presented with related images along the middle of the page, such as the names of specific restaurants, times they’re open, and where they’re located.

This is a strong hint for developers to include these topics in their content, or to create pages to leverage these related images.

Read on for some extremely useful tools that can help you find and optimize keywords:

Keyword Explorer by Moz – A one-stop shop from the SEO specialists at Moz, Keyword Explorer is a versatile, dynamic program that covers nearly every aspect of the keyword process. With Keyword Explorer, marketers can brainstorm keywords, build lists and filter them by topic; you can analyze metrics, click-through rates and other measures of effectiveness; and you can even spy on and assess keywords used by your business rivals.

SEMRush – Another great tool for SEO analysis, particularly where it concerns business intelligence, SEMRush allows you to identify and analyze the keywords that your competitors are using. Enter your competitor’s URL into the SEMRush search bar and you’ll be provided with a list of SEO keywords, along with their rankings and traffic. For instance, a search on Title Boxing, one of the most popular online boxing and kickboxing retailers, yields 90,500 organic searches for the term “punching bag” (fourth overall), as well as 60,500 results for “title boxing,” the name of both their in-house brand and retail store.

Interestingly, SEMRush also allows users to use a competitive positioning map, where they can see overall website traffic and keywords: Title Boxing boasts 150K+ in search traffic and 29K in keywords, far outpacing their closest competitors.

When considering which keyword tools to use, look for something that allows you to monitor a high volume of keywords broken down by relevant themes. Additionally, the best tools must ensure that you can track all your competitors, from large corporations to small, up-and-coming firms.

As always, go for quality and not quantity. It’s better to get 10 conversions from 100 visitors than it is to get 10 conversions from 1,000 visitors. Rather than casting a too-wide net, focus on keywords and topics that are within your niche, ones that you can optimize for and be the authority on. Fill in these gaps and establish yourself as an expert in this smaller field before tackling larger and broader keywords where the competition is much fiercer.

6. Build Backlinks

Despite what you might have heard, building backlinks is still crucial for good rankings.

What has changed is the way you must build backlinks if you want good results. Low-quality links that are easily spammed—blog comments, paid links, etc.—don’t seem to work anymore and can actively harm your site.

7. Reporting and Analytics

A critical part of SEO is reporting and analytics, which are indispensable to improving marketing strategies. By setting up an analytics platform to track both micro and macro events, you can understand your customer’s journey from your sales and marketing funnel.

For instance, what content really appealed to your customer? What part of the website had the most UX issues? Which page was the least (or most) visited, and why?

A) Datastudio

Having the ability to tie online data back to offline data to get a full 360 view of how your content and marketing is performing.

Along those lines, always be on the lookout to see what your competitors are doing, and how well it’s working. What techniques are they using? How have they changed their approach? What mistakes have they learned from?

B) Wayback Machine

One great tool to see how your competition has changed is Wayback Machine, which allows marketers to access petabytes of archived web pages. By sifting through Wayback Machine’s extensive database, you can track the evolution of your competitor’s brand and web presence, taking note of factors such as changes in UX design or differences in copy from one web version to the next.

Still, you shouldn’t implement something just because your competitor is doing it, whether that’s designing a website a certain way or using specific copy or images. This is especially true for larger websites like Amazon, which have much more leeway with search engines. Thanks to their numerous, highly skilled staff, they can test small changes and measure results with a high degree of accuracy.

If used correctly, Wayback Machine has some interesting lessons to offer any company. Take a look at these two screengrabs of Title Boxing. The top picture is a screengrab of Title’s homepage from Wayback Machine, circa 2007, while the bottom one is a screengrab from 2018.

The differences are pretty clear. In 2007, the web layout was much more cluttered and crowded, with small, hard-to-navigate sidebars squeezing some small, insignificant-looking pictures in the middle advertising daily specials.

In 2018, however, the user experience is much more streamlined. Visitors are greeted with a clear, easy-to-use sidebar at the top, labeled with categories like “Gloves,” “Punching Bags,” and many more. A large, sliding image in the center replaces the tiny, hard-to-notice ads from 2007, allowing buyers to see exactly what is on sale. The new website is almost minimalist, doing away with the previous confused, slightly chaotic format.

Clearly, Title has come a long way when it comes to UX, testing their changes and eventually settling on this new, simpler design. Still, it’s very likely that plenty of testing, design and redesign was put into this process, which is clear when you track their changes through Wayback Machine.

Be strategic about your changes, test them thoroughly, and examine how your competitors’ websites have evolved with Wayback Machine.

8. Technical Optimization

SEO and content tips aside, it’s absolutely essential to have a solid website, without worrying about any technical issues that may arise. With that being said, here are some tips and techniques to help you ensure that your website is up to par.

A) Switch to HTTPS

It’s a best practice that will help your website boost its SEO presence, stay secure, and make it harder for malicious parties to break in and take advantage of your website.

Granted, transitioning to HTTPS is easier said than done, and requires a multi-step process. When the Atlantic, a highly-regarded, well-established media organization, decided to move to HTTPS in early 2016, the transition was complex. First, content had to be scanned individually, then ported over and checked for compatibility. The process was repeated with ads, and once compatibility and security were ensured, the website slowly went live in order to guard against traffic loss and unforeseen errors.

If you’re a smaller organization, your process will likely be less painstaking or time consuming. All the same, moving to HTTPS is a necessity in a world of cybersecurity threats and heightened SEO and SEM requirements.

AMP JS, a library that manages the resource loading and best practices necessary for fast rendering

AMP cache, a content delivery network that both loads content and ensures speed.

Since AMP was only incorporated into the search giant’s results in February 2016, the format itself is still fairly new. For those of you who use WordPress, AMP should be much easier to implement than a home-grown CMS from scratch.

C) Budget Money for Crawlers

To ensure that Google is crawling your preferred pages and not pages that don’t appear in its index, turn to crawl programs like Deep Crawl or Botify. These SEO crawler programs are similar to Google’s own crawlers and will give you an overview of how your page will perform in SEO rankings.

Deep Crawl:Possibly the most comprehensive tool of its kind available today, Deep Crawl is the equivalent of a physical exam for your website, checking its SEO health and viability in an increasingly crowded market.In short, Deep Crawl will provide you with a laundry list of necessary improvements and errors, such as duplicate content, broken pages, flawed titles, descriptions and metadata.

Botify: A cloud-based crawler that has already signed up big names like Expedia, eBay, and BlaBla Car, Botify is one of the strongest crawlers available today, short of Google’s own secret algorithms.Not only can Botify check whether Google has crawled your page, it can also offer suggestions on how to restructure web content and site maps to optimize your web page for Google’s crawlers.Still, even with its diverse functions and fast crawl speed, Botify’s disadvantage is that it can be expensive: basic plans begin at around $500 per month, while larger options for bigger firms can run up to $10,000 annually.

D) Correct Your Semantic Markups

To help Google understand your data or to show your website smartcards and voice searches, you need to ensure that your semantic markups are correct.

Semantic markups are essentially HTML tags which can help emphasize key information on your website.

For instance, a heading tag (H1) can help a crawler understand precisely what your content is about. If you tag “Five Holiday Destinations in Eastern Europe” with a H1, then a crawler will know to sort your blog post under relevant categories, such as holidays or Eastern European travel.

In short, edit your semantic markups so that they reflect your data and information as accurately as possible.

E) Fix 404 Errors

Nothing will sink your website faster in search rankings than a 404 error, when a search engine can’t find the desired web page and leads to a dead end. It’s in your interest to fix these broken or missing pages and re-engage your users as soon as you can.

Whatever platform you use, be it Google Analytics or Oracle, take a look at the number of pageviews for your 404 page. Then add URL as a secondary dimension and fix the biggest offenders first.

This way, you can boost UX and regain any inbound links from those pages.

F) Web Browser and WordPress Plugins

To make your job easier, there are a number of web browser and WordPress plugins that you can use. We’ve listed a few of them below, along with a brief description of their capabilities and common uses.

Redirection by WordPress: An easy plugin that seamlessly integrates into your WordPress interface, Redirection allows you to keep track of 404 errors, 301 redirects, and generally keep your website tight and functioning smoothly. It’s especially useful for those who are moving their web pages from one site to another, or for directory changes.

Canonical: This plug-in handles content syndication, which essentially allows other blogs to publish your work (similar to franchising) without hurting your website’s SEO ranking—simply by adding a rel=canonical tag.You can get your brand and content out on the web in multiple outlets, ensuring a greater reach and bigger audience without hurting your own search results.

Ultimate Nofollow: This simple, easy-to-use plugin automatically inserts `rel=nofollow` and `target=_blank`into your hyperlinks, which alerts search crawlers.This way, you won’t accidentally boost the rankings of other pages simply by linking to them, or fall victim to pageview or link-related spam.

SEOQuake: A plugin for your web browser, not WordPress, SEOQuake allows users to quickly and seamlessly assess SEO attributes of any website without opening up extra programs. You can audit your page’s SEO health, compare SEO metrics for a number of pages, and analyze both external and internal links on any given web page.

9. Local SEO and Listings

In the digital era, it’s easy to forget that people still visit physical shops and establishments. True, they may use online resources to research, but plenty of commerce is still conducted in real life. If you have a brick-and-mortar business, you can’t neglect local SEO and listings if you want to stay profitable.

A) Correcting Your Listings

As powerful as search engines like Google or Bing are, they still can’t be everywhere at once, and have to rely on additional information from local, on-the-ground sources,which gather, aggregate, and submit relevant data for area businesses. These aggregators will do much of the legwork, pulling information from physical directories (like Yellow Pages) or scanning business registrations.

In a nutshell, bigger search engines will rely on these data aggregators to fill in the gaps of the existing information already in their databases, and will also cross-check to make sure that the facts are up-to-date. Problems arise, however, when aggregators collect out-of-date data, leading a search engine like Google or Bing to list the wrong information, like an old address for your business or a disconnected phone number.

That’s why it’s critical to ensure that your physical contact information is as current as possible.

The first step is to identify any obsolete information that may be out there. Because Google is the largest search engine, start withGoogle My Business, its free-to-use listing service, and update your data accordingly. Be sure to list important details like extra locations, the latest opening hours, and what forms of payment are acceptable.

Then, use a local directory management service, which carries out the painstaking, tedious work of scanning countless local directories, interacting with data aggregators, and correcting any old information. The best of these are Moz Local and Yext, which can help you avoid any glaring inconsistencies that can hurt your revenue stream, or even worse, trick Google’s algorithms into thinking that you’re a different business entirely.

Next, use your directory management service to hit at least some of the major data aggregator services. While these companies do vary by location, some of the bigger names are Infogroup, Acxiom, and Localeze, all of which provide information on millions of business listings to larger search engines.

From that point on, local search listings should be accurately and automatically updated by your management service.

B) Technical SEO for Local

Carrying out technical SEO for local search engines is a similar process.

You may be questioning the point of optimizing for local search engines, especially given Google’s unquestioned dominance of the search landscape. Even so, local search engines are still extremely useful. After all, if you’re a physical, brick-and-mortar establishment, you will benefit greatly from having in-store visits.

In the case of the example below, the schema gives extra information about the venue’s hours, location, general information, and more:

As you can see, schema is a game-changer: you can make your site more visible in Google and quickly add brief, useful data for the benefit of users.

If you want to go a step further, you can also include a JSON (Javascript Object Notation) injection through Google Tag Manager. JSON is a form of data that is easily read by humans and artificial intelligences alike, and familiar to anyone who has ever used C++, Javascript, Python, and more.

With Google Tag Manager, however, it’s easy to combine schema and JSON together to further boost the strength of your schema, resulting in a higher CTR and visibility, without having to spend precious time and lines of code. Granted, the learning curve is a bit steep for those who aren’t familiar with Javascript or another basic programming language, but once set in place, JSON injections can help execute and put structured data in place simply and efficiently.

10. Guest Posting

Guest blogging is a method used by bloggers to increase blog traffic where they write posts to be published on another blog.

Few years ago this method was deemed dead because of all the spammy content and paid links. However, this is not true anymore. As long as the blog post has original and high quality content, Google will not penalize you. Just be sure to avoid duplicate and repetitive content.

The key to building a blog to rank higher is to have a niche in your domain and build your blog posts around this topic. Pick a specific domain instead over a broad topic one. Become an expert in that domain.

If you’re an amateur blogger on the block, your first goal would be to increase SERP ranking. If you’re new to this space, it’ll definitely take a while to increase ranking. Guest blogging is one way to climb up the ladder sooner than you might otherwise be able to do. You have two ways to do this. You can offer to write a guest post for a popular blog in your space or request a popular blogger to write a guest post for your blog. Both ways it’s a win win for you.

Now how do you approach an authoritative blogger to publish your content on their blog? Here’s a how:

First, find top bloggers in your niche. Search for ‘Top blogs/bloggers in software development’, replace ‘software development’ with your niche. If you did your homework, I’m sure you’ll recognize some of these blogs in the search results.

Find the blogger’s contact, LinkedIn or social media account and reach out to them and offer to write a guest post. Since you’re asking for a favor, be proactive and propose a list of titles to write that they’d be interested in. This makes their job easier by picking a title.

You can also use tools to find top blogs by their geographical location.

If you’re particular about your target audience location use relevant keywords and location in SERP tool and find the sites ranked 1-50. Look for those authors. Usually, they’ll be willing to accept guest posts.

When you write a guest post for a popular blog, you obviously can post a link to your personal blog and profile. Voila, everyone who reads your post will click the link to your blog to find more interesting posts. When get links from authoritative blogs it will definitely improve your ranking. You can do the same with popular social media accounts.

As a side note, you shouldn’t pay for links. It’s always best to build your links than buy them. It’s the quality not the quantity that matters. Google is smart enough to differentiate between both. Learn more about best and bad practices in this post titled “Don’t buy links, build them.”

Follow some of the methods that Brian talks about in detail about white hat linking-building strategies that will grow your ranking organically.

SEO Is Constantly Changing

Ultimately, SEO is rapidly changing from one year to the next—even from one month to the next. Business owners and marketers have to adapt quickly, but it’s still possible to give your business website the edge on your competition.

Just remember to focus on solid content creation and copywriting fundamentals, engage your viewers deeply, and stay abreast of technical trends like backlinks, SEO health, site speed, and schema.

If all this seems overwhelming—take a deep breath. Taking the effort to understand even the basics of SEO will help your site gain higher click-through rates, engagement, and of course, rankings. A little bit of reading and tinkering on your own can still go a very long way.

Want more personalized, specific advice on how you can start ranking for competitive terms in your niche, become recognized as a thought leader in your industry, and make more money through organic search traffic? Click the green button below to schedule a time to chat!

The traditional way to land a job is to send a CV and wait for someone to notice it, call you and try to impress them during the interview. While many companies still rely on this recruiting style, there’s also another important element that makes a big difference in 2018: your personal brand.

It’s possible to land the job of your dreams without sending a CV at all, as long as you are aware of the importance of building an online reputation in your field.

You cannot get from “nobody” to a respected influencer overnight. However, you can work towards it by building a strong and powerful personal brand, one that can impress recruiters, clients, peers or whichever social group you are targeting right now.

A great way to do this is through webinars. What are webinars and why are they a good option for personal branding? Let me try to answer these questions in this article.

What Is a Webinar?

The webinar (aka online conference, web seminar, etc.), is an online presentation or meeting held live over the Internet. Unlike live conferences and seminars, webinars do not require the speaker to travel to another place or to book a conference space. The webinar can be broadcast from your own home, office or any other place that has a computer connected to the Internet.

The average attendance of a webinar varies from40% to 50% of the registrants. These are great numbers considering that if you engage in email marketing, you won’t get anopen rate higher than 30%. And the click-through rate is ten times lower than the open rate!

Advantages of Webinars

There are many advantages when it comes to webinars. The first and the most palpable advantage is, of course, the fact that you don’t need to travel in order to speak to your audience. It’s more than convenient to be able to talk to or teach them from the comfort of your home or office.

The second advantage is the fact that you are able to speak to a wider, global audience. Anyone who has a device connected to the Internet can see and hear your speech and engage directly with you. Most of the webinar tools feature built-in chats, polls, and surveys that can make every discourse interactive and engaging.

Finally, we cannot ignore another important thing about webinars: they are usually broadcast live but the audience is, in most cases, able to download the presentation later and review it as many times as they want to. Also, they share the same comfort the speaker has, as they don’t have to leave their homes in order to take part in the presentation.

Why Are Webinars Great for Personal Branding?

People attend seminars, courses, and public speeches when they are interested in particular subjects and want to learn more from an expert. Usually, they respect the speakers and value them as professionals and influencers in their fields. Therefore, if you want to gain more respect and more influence, you need to get out of the comfort zone of your blog and do something more. Public speaking is an easy and yet effective way to do so.

Public speaking brands you as an expert in your field. I know, webinars are held via the Internet, but they are still public. Even when they require a paid subscription, they are still available to all paying subscribers and everybody who is interested in your topic can become one.

Webinars and public speeches increase your credibility. People sign up for webinars and conferences in order to learn more about a specific topic. They regard the speakers with respect and view them as experts in their field, as long as they have valuable information to share with the audience.

Webinars are great for networking. You get to increase your credibility but at the same time, you have the chance to meet other people interested in the same topics as you are. Some of them might be experts, while others may prove to be future clients of yours.

How to Launch Your First Webinar

We already know what a webinar is and why it is a great marketing strategy for almost anybody. Now we’re ready to learn how to launch one. There are several tools available online and you will have to choose the right one for you, of course.

However, I dare to make a suggestion and present you with one of the most professional and easy to work with tools I have ever tried: Clickmeeting’s webinar apps.

Starting with the answer to the first question of “what is a webinar” and up to the branding and promotion of your own online conferences, their services are up to speed with the diverse demand of all marketers.

In short, Clickmeeting is a browser-based tool that allows you to create, schedule and run webinars. Here’s what you need to do in order to get started and schedule your first event.

1) Sign up. Clickmeeting is a professional service, so you will need a budget in order to be able to use it to its full capacity. However, once you sign up, you get access to a trial version which will allow you to test the tools first to learn how to use them.

2) Head to the basic tutorial. Once you log in for the first time, the welcome screen appears, guiding you through the first steps of scheduling a webinar. If you feel confident in your skills, you can go directly to the Control Panel, but I suggest going through their basic tutorial if this is your first time on their website.

3) Create your first event. As you can see from the following screenshot, this is the step where you name your webinar, choose how the audience accesses it, and set the date for the event.

4) Build your invite list. Once you’re finished with the previous screen, click on “Create and invite.” This is where you get to invite your chosen audience to join your live session.

5) Create the invitation. The last step is to actually create the invitation. Here you have several options such as:

Copy and paste: Insert the emails of your contacts, one by one, in the field available below.

Search: Choose from your already created groups of contacts if this is not your first webinar.

Copy details: Get all the details you need in order to send your invitations via email newsletter.

How to Promote Your Webinars

It’s not enough to create a webinar and send the invitation to your contacts. You need to promote this amazing event in order to reach out to a wider audience and the best tools for this are email newsletters and social media.

I know, newsletters may still include your known contacts in the addresses list, but at the same time, they look better than a simple invitation and can include more information that the audience may dig.

You can even choose to invest a part of your budget to promote your webinars via social media ads in order to get the attention of as many interested people as possible.

What do you need in order to make sure your webinar is attractive to your audience? Design attractive, professional-looking banners. It may seem hard to do it if you are not a professional designer but trust me, it isn’t. There are many great design tools available online for professional banner design.

To this end, I recommendBannersnack. It’s easy to use, it is designed for social media banners in particular, and it features a great pool of templates and stock photos to choose from if you need to get inspired quickly.

Here’s an example of a great banner design and I will explain why I think so:

There’s a picture of the speaker, a background stock photo that relevant to the main topic, and some key information that is useful to the viewer. The date of the webinar is clearly visible and so is the name and credentials of the speaker.

Also, there is a short tagline that informs the audience about how they may benefit from attending the webinar.

Email Promotion

Email newsletters are responsible for more than80% of clients acquired and retained through online marketing. They are important regardless of the type of content you are advertising or the products you are selling. Consequently, they can be a powerful tool for promoting webinars, as long as you know what to do.

Here are two important things you should take into consideration:

1) Email subject line. This is the first thing that people who receive your emails see: thesubject line of your email. This is why it is important to come up with a compelling subject that will convince the viewer to open the email and read your offer. Check out this great example of a simple yet effective subject line:

2) The content. Now it’s time to put some effort into creating the banner and the content that will convince the viewer to attend the webinar. The key elements that should be present here are:

Header banner (you can use the banner you have previously shared on social media)

Information about the speaker

Details about the content of the webinar

Key elements that should convince the viewer to attend the seminar

Date and time of the webinar

Link to the website where the viewer can subscribe to the webinar

Example of a great newsletter design for webinar announcement:

Why does this design work? Well, as you can see, it includes all the elements described above. Also, it features a simple and professional design with attention to details and sufficient use of white space.

Success Stories

The first example of a webinar success story comes from Jon Schumacher, a webinar specialist who took the time to explain in avery well-documented case study how he managed to create a successful webinar. According to his own words, the profit generated by his hosted webinar was $13,420.

Conclusion

Webinars are a great way to promote and grow your personal brand and establish yourself as an expert in your field. There are many success stories out there if you feel the need to get some inspiration and many of them come not from big companies but from professional individuals who rely on their own image in order to make sales and profits.

]]>Raghav Haranhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/raghavharan/http://www.singlegrain.com?p=9375&preview_id=93752018-05-23T19:46:08Z2018-05-15T20:00:00ZNOW UPDATED! This post has been expanded with new cold email tools for 2018. Enjoy!

When you’re doing cold e-mail outreach, there comes a point when you realize that you’re spending a whole lot of time doing a lot of repetitive work… and need to add a sales automation tool to your workflow.

Cyrus Roepers would spend his entire morning sending out cold e-mails and follow ups. Many salespeople end up doing the same thing. We have to deal with copying and pasting, constant data entry, regularly going through our inbox, and then copying and pasting again for follow up e-mails.

And if we want to increase the volume of e-mails we send out, that means we have to take even more time out of our day to do it.

It can get really time consuming.

Fortunately, there are some startups that have tackled this problem by offering cold e-mail automation solutions. Close.io lets you track all your e-mails, follow ups, and even cold calls in one place, and you can contact any of your leads with a simple click. Other companies like Persist IQ focus on scaling personalized 1-on-1 communication so you can increase the volume of e-mails you send out without sacrificing quality.

These tools can save you valuable hours in your day, help you increase the volume of e-mails you send out, and boost your conversions at the same time. For example, Persist IQ helped Parse.ly send out 5x more e-mails per week while bumping up their reply rate by 10%.

In this post, we’ll talk about the best cold e-mail automation tools that will help you completely change the way you do sales.

Close.io

Close.io allows salespeople to send more e-mails, make sales calls, and do away with manual data entry.

Their software allows you to track all communication with your leads in one spot. For example, you might send one introductory e-mail to your prospect, then get them on a sales call, then get them on another call with someone higher up, etc. All that communication is automatically tracked within Close.io without the need for any data entry.

Besides making calls and sending e-mails through the software itself, you can pre-load templates and the software will automatically populate them with the right information.

Close.io makes it really simple for companies to scale their sales teams and make their processes more efficient. In fact, on their homepage, you can see that they’ve had successful customers who have switched over from competitors such as HelloSign. This positive feedback is also reflected in the case studies.

If you put more time into crafting the pre-existing templates before uploading them to Close.io, then the scale of the platform could amplify the effects of personalization.

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Reply

Reply claims to be able to scale your sales outreach while keeping your e-mails personal.

Through their system, you can set your own e-mail sequence for follow ups and then A/B test them to maximize your conversions. This saves you time that you could be spending on other, more important things than just data entry or manual organization.

HotelsByDay used Reply to save 7 hours a week for each salesperson. They used the software to contact their leads through an automated campaign with an automated follow up sequence.

What the the COO of HotelsByDay liked best about Reply is the in-depth data reporting — you can easily see all the stats and indicators of your e-mail campaigns, including active and paused prospects, open rates, delivery, stage of the campaign, bounced e-mails, and more. He also liked the default pausing of the automated follow ups to prospects who have responded to a previous e-mail (so they wouldn’t require follow ups).

HotelsByDay have been able to close a whopping 50% of deals after the Reply campaign, while actually saving time each week.

Reply also helped People HR generate an additional $15,000 in a few months, along with $5,000 in recurring revenue. The feature that they liked the most was the ability to automatically filter out certain prospects from the series of automated messages based on their behavior. This way, they were able to boost the number of e-mails they sent out while also keeping the interaction personalized.

RelocateMe used Reply to get an immediate 37% reply rate after implementing the software. After switching from another CRM to Reply, they were able to stop bulk e-mailing their prospects with the same generic template and instead craft campaigns that were more personalized.

They found that they were able to strengthen their current client relationships as well because of the personalized outreach, and thought that Reply’s features made it a worthwhile investment.

They also have a tool that integrates with Google Chrome to allow you to get your prospect’s information from sites like LinkedIn, and then automatically populate them into your e-mail campaigns. This will make your lead gen efforts much more efficient.

PersistIQ has a proven record of helping companies who want to scale their cold e-mail outreach while maintaining that personal connection that drives conversions. For example, they helped Lever get a 91% open rate and a 39% reply rate while saving an entire day’s worth of work each week.

They also helped Parse.ly boost their reply rates by 10% and increase their e-mail outreach by 5x per week, and helped Backerkit get a 25.1% reply rate and save nearly 2 hours per day. Previously, Backerkit was using a “duct tape” sales solution with multiple CRMs and an Excel spreadsheet. They were able to reduce the time spent on tedious tasks and spend more time using PersistIQ’s features to get more of the right people through the top of their funnel.

Gusto saw a 10% open rate increase, a 3x response increase, and a 10x rep productivity increase after implementing PersistIQ. The sales reps at Gusto were previously doing the same tedious activities over 50 times per day which led to lower employee morale and a higher risk of human error. Using PersistIQ, they were able to stop logging activities across multiple databases and manually tracking follow ups.

One downside seems to be that PersistIQ doesn’t track cold calls that companies make to their prospects. Because outbound sales often involve both cold e-mails and calling leads, it may be more efficient to have an all-in-one solution that helps scale both cold calling and cold e-mailing.

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Sendbloom

Sendbloom is another tool that helps sales teams scale their cold outreach while keeping e-mails personalized.

The main difference between Sendbloom and other similar solutions is their segmentation tool.

Sendbloom allows salespeople to send prospects highly relevant e-mails because of the level of granularity they offer when it comes to segmentation. This means, for example, that you’d be able to figure out whether your potential customers are using KISSmetrics or Mixpanel for their analytics.

You can even analyze the type of software that your prospects use on their sites so that you can tailor your e-mails based on that information. This is especially useful if your company is trying to get prospects to switch from a highly-established solution to your new software. By understanding the details of what they use, you’ll have a good sense of their current workflow, and you’ll be able to send more personalized messages to increase your likelihood of getting a response.

Sendbloom has technology that helps salespeople write more personalized e-mails compared to other similar solutions. This technology analyzes the prospect’s website in depth, so you’ll know the various types of software they use, their web frameworks, and more.

Like the other platforms, Sendbloom also offers in-depth data analytics so you’ll know exactly who is opening your e-mails, who replied, which e-mails bounced, and more.

Mixmax

Mixmax is a cold email outreach tool that comes with a variety of additional features that salespeople can leverage to close more deals.

Here are a few of the features they have:

Email tracking. Email tracking is a “table stakes” feature that lets sales reps see when someone opens one of their emails. This makes it easier to gauge response rates, and see where the “friction” in the sales process lies. For example, if your open rates are low but your response rates are high, that means your email is written well but probably needs a different subject line.With Mixmax’s email tracking feature, you can see when your email was opened, and how many times. They also have added a geographic location tracker, where you can see which locations your recipients were in when they opened your emails.

One click meetings. Appointment setting is a pretty big pain for most salespeople. Once your recipient agrees to get on the phone and chat, there’s usually a long email thread that follows where you and your recipients try to find a time to chat. With Mixmax’s one click scheduling, your recipients can schedule a time in your calendar directly from the email.

Send later. Another fairly standard feature Mixmax provides is scheduling emails to be delivered later. For example, if you’re writing emails and catching up on your inbox late at night, you’d want to schedule your emails to be delivered at an appropriate time the next day. This feature can also be used to send yourself reminders if you need it.

Mixmax sequences. Sequences are the holy grail of cold email automation. Based on people’s responses and behavior throughout the sequence, you can send them particular emails and exclude them from others. You can automate followups, personalize emails at scale, Mixmax currently integrates with Gmail, Google Inbox, and Salesforce.

Advanced embedding. Mixmax allows you to embed things like slide decks, PDFs, and more directly in the email. That way, you don’t need to persuade your recipients to click on the link you want them to click on — they’ll already see it directly in the email.

Outreach

Outreach is an all-in-one system that makes the workflows of sales teams more efficient.

This software is probably the most comprehensive tool for sales teams out of everything we’ve covered. Through Outreach, salespeople can make calls to any city or country, automate their cold e-mail outreach, and integrate social media as part of their sales process. They’ll soon be adding an SMS integration feature along with postcard delivery and “swag” delivery to turn fans into advocates.

As with Reply, Outreach also allows salespeople to create automated e-mail sequences for their prospects.

In addition to all this, Outreach offers data on the personas of the people you’re reaching out to, and other patterns and insights that could help you send more personalized messages to the right people — like measuring e-mail engagement by role within the company. They also have a wide array of integrations for various aspects of the workflow.

Outreach helped Virool’s sales reps save an additional two hours per day and help them increase the number of qualified meetings by 3.5x. They called Outreach an “irreplaceable tool” because it not only handled all the minutiae and eliminated the chance of having duplicate e-mails in the system or spamming potential prospects, but because of the peace of mind it gave them!

The platform also allows a company to communicate with a vast array of prospects in a way that feels like it’s 1-on-1 because of the comprehensive features and analytics provided.

Outreach helped Bizible convert 6% more leads into demo appointments, and helped their leads convert into 2.8% more opportunities. Bizible was able to A/B test their subject lines, e-mail copy, and automated e-mail sequences. They were able to just set a sequence and forget about it instead of constantly thinking about where each prospect was in the sales cycle while copy and pasting e-mail templates.

While Outreach does boast a large number of features and integrations, they also have the highest cost. Because of this, they may be a better fit for more established companies with a larger budget.

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Mailshake

Mailshake is an email outreach tool that makes it easy for you to promote content, build relationships and generate leads – and all you need is a Google account. Mailshake is a great resource for cold emails as it allows you to track emails, automate follow-up messages and hit pause on any email or even the whole campaign.

It provides many popular email templates (i.e. pre-written messages) that you can personalize by answering just a few simple questions, such as:

Guest posts

Content promotion

Lead generation

Link-building

PR Pitches

With this tool you can monitor clicks and replies, view charts and stats on the progress of your emails and easily scroll through recent activity to see the full history of any email thread.

It now has a new feature called Lead Catcher which you can personalize. For example, if you decide that a lead is only someone who replies to rather than simply opens your email, you can easily adjust the criteria. And when you finally close that lead or even assign it to another member of your team, Lead Catcher will automatically take you to the next one in your queue.

Because all your communications, including clicks and opens, with leads are in one convenient place, it’s easy to see the history of messages sent and received and therefore reply with the needed context.

SalesHandy

SalesHandy is a SaaS-based sales communication and analytics tool that allows you to engage smartly with prospects and close more deals. This tracking, productivity and outreach tool includes such features as Email Tracking and Scheduling, Mail Merge Campaigns, and Auto Follow Up.

Apart from the most important features, SalesHandy also provides Link Tracking, Document Tracking, and Analytics. In short, it is a total power-packed tool!

With this tool, you can get real-time notifications when someone opens your e-mail and there are no limitations on the number of notifications you can receive or of e-mails sent. SalesHandy works with Gmail and Outlook, and you can send and track e-mails from these platforms with Outlook Plugin and Gmail plugin for Chrome — and some of the features can be accessed by using their web application.

You’ll get detailed analytics of each stage, like bounce rate and the exact reason why, which will help your sales teams perfect their sales and marketing strategies. It will also give you valuable insight into customer behavior, spot trends, and evaluate sales performance, making it a great tool for small- and medium-sized companies.

Conclusion

Considering that email is the principal channel for lead generation for 89% of marketers, using a tool that makes the whole process easy, organized and authentic is imperative.

There are a variety of ways to increase the effectiveness of your cold e-mails. For example, you could increase the number of people you reach out to so you have more volume, create a better subject line so you get a higher open rate, or increase the personalization of each e-mail to boost the likelihood of a response.

As sales teams get larger and larger, executing on all of these things takes up a lot of time. Sales reps may spend hours longer than they need to on maintaining Excel spreadsheets to remember where the prospects are in the sales cycle or copying and pasting templated e-mails to new prospects. They also have to spend time doing research on prospects to figure out how exactly to personalize the e-mail.

All these repetitive tasks can lower employee morale and increase the risk of human error due to the number of steps involved.

The sales automation tools we discussed in this post help companies eliminate all of these problems.

Close.io makes it really simple for companies to scale their sales teams by allowing you to send more e-mails, track all communication with your leads in one spot, and pre-load templates so the software will automatically populate them with the right information.

Sendbloom offers hyper-targeted segmentation so that you can send personalized cold e-mails based on the most granular details about the company you’re reaching out to.

Outreach offers a highly comprehensive system to not only send highly personalized e-mails, but also make calls, send text messages or company-branded items, and track them for each prospect.

PersistIQ includes a Chrome extension to figure out the right types of information about your prospect through their professional site so that you can quickly send out e-mails instead of digging through pages and pages of details.

Reply lets you A/B test e-mail sequences and subject lines so you can figure out exactly which template formats generate the most open rates and responses, and then double down on what works.

Mailshake makes it easy to organize your cold email campaigns by using personalized templates, automating follow-up messages and hitting pause on any email quickly – all from your Google account. And its Lead Catcher feature makes tracking and closing leads a breeze.

Mixmaxmakes it easy to schedule emails, create sequences, schedule appointments with your email recipients, and embed graphics like presentations, PDFs, and links in a beautiful way within the email.

SalesHandy allows you to engage smartly with prospects and close more deals, which helps sales teams perfect their sales and marketing strategies. This tracking, productivity and outreach tool includes such features as Email Tracking and Scheduling, Mail Merge Campaigns, and Auto Follow Up, Link Tracking, Document Tracking, and Analytics.

There’s no doubt that predictive analytics has been all the rage for the last few years—and for good reason. The new algorithm-based discipline has empowered us to bring about insights that provide details on the probability of a given outcome, as well as helping us bring about the ones that are favorable.

Use cases of data science and predictive modeling comes in the form of trip-planning tools, where customers can set locations, dates, miles program memberships, hotel needs, and other factors that affect travel details. These products mark an evolution toward user-friendly data science, with tools that essentially turn the customer into the data scientist, allowing them to create their own models to return desired results.

We’ve even seen data science and predictive modeling utilized by influential companies such as Airbnb.

Back in 2014, Airbnb hosts had a problem: they never knew how to price their rentals. There were so many variables: seasonality, location and individual preferences, as well as the amenities and unique features of each property. How could hosts come up with a nightly fee that was both reflective of all those factors and likely to get them a booking?

Airbnb uses data science to solve a lot of company-wide problems; previously, they relied on data-backed insights to improve the gender diversity of their team. So when hosts needed help picking their prices, it made sense to build a selection of predictive models for them.

Enter the Aerosolve model, a dynamic pricing model designed to synthesize multiple variables to help listers pick the ideal rate for their rental. This tool is more than a mere algorithm, however. It employs machine learning technology so that data is continuously fed back into the tool. Realizing that Aerosolve had many additional potential applications, Airbnb decided to upload the code on Github for open source access.

However, what’s unique about the model is its usability. Layers are compressed into a simplified format that allows end users to understand insights—in this case, their probability of receiving a booking—as they adjust factors like the price and date.

The presentation of predictive tools in an easy-to-digest, consumer-facing user interface is exactly what the future has in store for data science.

From Predictive to Prescriptive

Those applications are also emblematic of a change sweeping through commercial data science. Data scientists are moving toward practical applications of prescriptive, rather than predictive, modeling. Whereas the latter uses historical data to predict the probability of future of events (i.e. the likelihood that it will rain tomorrow), the former assumes an active human agent capable of influencing outcomes.

Descriptive analytics is the first stage of business analytics in which you look at historical data and performance.

Predictive analytics is the second stage of business analytics in which past data is used with algorithms to predict a future outcome.

Prescriptive analytics is the third stage of business analytics in which you determine the best course of action.

Data scientists might build a prescriptive uplift model to predict the likelihood of converting a lead with a certain offer, for instance, or to tell whether offering a sign-on bonus will influence a prospective employee’s probability of accepting the job.

In this way, it is much more useful for proactive planning—such as in the Airbnb use case. It also marks a blurring of the line between machine and human interactions. Older predictive models, for instance, merely offered end users insight into an event’s likelihood. It was up to human agents to decide what to do with that information.

Prescriptive uplift modeling, however, can calculate event outcomes if end users choose to pursue a certain course of action. It can, therefore, estimate whether a marketing campaign is likely to win over a certain demographic or offer solutions for a political campaign hoping to win over swing voters.

Deep Learning: Machines Take On the Processing Patterns of Their Makers

The trend toward prescriptive modeling is an interesting development, philosophically-speaking, given the growing popularity of machine-learning technologies. Modern data scientists are often called upon to work closely with software engineers in the development of new automated tools, and many of those products will employ machine learning technology.

You’ve probably already heard of this technological development—it’s a very popular buzzword in the data science field right now. However, what is less well known is precisely what machine learning is, and how it relates back to big data and data science.

Machine learning offers extraordinarily powerful applications of big data and statistical probability. It breaks down the divisions between data collection and data processing.Click To Tweet

Here, machines incrementally adjust behavior and responses based on environmental data; hence, the “learning” part of the name. A real-life example of this is Amazon’s recommendation tool. The more data that users feed the tool through browsing and buying, the more precise the recommendations become.

Tools like these are evidence of real-time interactions between humans and devices. As humans respond to results, machines tailor their next offerings based on that feedback. It’s a lot more like a conversation than a chain of commands.

One particular segment of machine learning, known as deep learning, takes this evolution to the extreme. Deep learning models the structure and processing patterns of the human mind: deep learning computers are built with neural networks, with layers of nodes built on top of one another. This architecture allows nodes to make connections to one another in a nonlinear fashion, calling upon certain processing domains as necessary.

Deep learning technologies are particularly useful for mimicking the kind of visual processing performed by the brain as it responds to signals from the eyes.

For instance, the Google Translate app uses deep learning to translate unembedded text from images into another language. A user traveling in another country can snap a picture of a box of cereal or a street sign and upload it to Google Translate. Google then identifies the text on the box and returns a translation in their native language.

Similarly, another Google project, Google Sunroof, takes images from the Google Earth application and creates realistic 3D models of rooftops to use in solar installation. Using deep learning neural networks, the Sunroof tool is able to differentiate roof surfaces from trees or cars, even with the existence of obscuring factors, like shadow and tree coverage.

Deep learning tools like these allow data scientists to build predictive models based on unstructured data, such as images, video and audio, rather than merely relying on structured information like text or numbers. In this way, it opens up huge swaths of commercial data previously left untapped.

Data Science Converging with AI

Both machine learning and deep learning are applications of artificial intelligence (AI), and the evolving use of AI technologies like these will deeply impact the practice of data science. Again, the overarching trend is the evolution away from tools that are merely informational to ones that are transformational, as rightly pointed out by author and AI expert Carlos Perez.

AI tools take the journey from data gathering to data processing, and go one step further, by synthesizing data into designs and solutions.Click To Tweet

For instance, Autodesk’s Project Dreamcatcher is a computer-aided design (CAD) system that uses AI to generate 3D product designs based on criteria imputted by designers, such as the functional objectives, materials required, manufacturing method, and budget.

The difference between this project and the type of tools in regular rotation today is that they don’t just allow end users to build designs. They actually provide sets of data-based solutions and help designers form prototypes designed to address specific problems.

Tools like these anticipate a future where data science moves from a strictly analytical function (synthesizing big data and offering insights and recommendations) to more product development and R&D applications.

However, some experts believe that AI technologies will eventually become so commonplace as to be ubiquitous, essentially ushering in a new industrial revolution. Machine-learning AI devices will likely affect a wide range of industries—from advertising to zoology and everything in between.

AI tools can not only do the work of the human mind, but in many cases they can do it more effectively than we ever could. Machines like these are able to mathematically prove insights that humans could only feel. Take, for instance, the company Affectiva, which uses AI equipment to recognize human emotions—anger, joy, surprise—as effectively as human leaders in commercial focus groups.

The End of Human-Driven Data Science?

The success of automated machine-learning tools like the ones described so far have left some in the data science field wondering if there will come a point where human experts are not necessary at all. The advanced processing potential of neural networks may very well automate the work of data scientists—in essence, according to some experts, data scientists may very well write themselves out of a job.

The question looms large in front of today’s employers. Data scientists might have been dubbed the “sexiest job of the 21st century” back in 2012, but today, the future of the role isn’t quite as clear. At a recent MIT symposium, experts mused on the field’s sustainability, with ADP VP and Chief Security Officer Roland Cloutier eventually declaring that it wasn’t wise for budding STEM students to pursue data science, since, in his words, “over time, software will do more and more of what data scientists do today.”

As Fortune points out, tools like Tableau have already made incredible strides to simplify data visualization, and there are many new programs in development to address workflows and data interpretations.

KDNuggets, an industry site for Business Analysts, Data Scientists, and Machine Learning Developers, recently polled readers for their thoughts on the matter. Only 18.8% felt that data scientists were irreplaceable by machines. Fifty-one percent, meanwhile, said they expected most tasks to be automated in less than 10 years.

Of course, not everyone has such a gloomy take on the matter. As the Harvard Business Review points out, machines are becoming much “smarter,” perhaps even more so than humans in some cases. And yet, they still largely lack the human capability to narrate their experience. Data and insights may be more complex, but devices can’t always tell us how they got there. Machines might be excellent at answering questions, but they may never be as competent as human experts at coming up with new challenges and problems to solve.

Likewise, there are times where a machine’s superhuman precision propels it across the boundaries of social mores. A famous example of this is Target, who successfully used consumer data to predict when female customers were expecting. That created the fairly awkward situation of a father learning about his teenage daughter’s pregnancy from the ads that she received in the mail. So while machines are able to make complex deductions based on patterned behavior, they’re not always able to come up with a sophisticated, tactful response—especially when the response in question falls into a moral gray area.

That argument points toward a future where data scientists behave something like “machine whisperers,” helping devices steer clear of social faux pas, and generating the missions and projects they engage in.

The Near Future of Data Science

Of course, with technology moving as fast as it does, it’s very hard to predict what any job will look like 15 years from now. In the meantime, we do know that the demand for data science is on the rise—IBM predicts a 28% increase by 2020—with most of that growth centered around finance, insurance, professional services, and IT.

For those who do work in data science, the challenge will be staying ahead of the technology. Data scientists must be constantly swimming, learning new programs and staying on top of where the field is going. However, given that many tasks may become automated in the near future, it would be wise for the businesses creating those jobs to look for candidates who can eventually take on leadership roles as data science jobs evolve.

Although hard skills will always be in high demand, with AI in the picture we are increasingly hurtling towards a future where soft skills, like data interpretation and the ability to build human relationships and identify problems, will be what separates us from machine workers. Ironically, by engaging more machines in our daily lives, we may be able to reconnect with—and learn to value—those abilities that make us most human.

Running an SEO campaign takes a little more effort than simply plugging keywords into your website. If you’re going to do it right, you need to make sure that you’re leaving no stone unturned. It all starts with finding the right keywords, coming up with an effective marketing strategy, and building links that drive traffic to your website.

Unlike traditional marketing, SEO is all about impressing Google by creating a meaningful experience that truly appeals to your viewers.Click To Tweet

Just about every company is dabbling in the world of SEO these days, so the competition is going to be stiff. Unless you know how to properly implement your SEO strategy, you run the risk of getting drowned out by all the noise from your competitors, especially if your business belongs to an industry with lots of heavy hitters.

Getting ahead means devoting resources to understanding the latest SEO trends, as Google is constantly updating their SEO best practices. But make sure that the resources you use are up-to-date because SEO guidelines from just a few years ago are already in danger of becoming extinct.

If you’re reading this article, you’re already taking a step towards getting a sense of the current SEO landscape. This piece is designed to give business owners an introduction into the steps they should be taking to implement an effective SEO strategy without blowing their budget. After all, SEO is a massive undertaking and you need to use your money wisely.

Here is a step-by-step guide to learn how to implement a cost-effective SEO campaign.

Step 1: Research Keywords and Your Competitors

Every SEO campaign is based around certain keywords that you’ll be using throughout your website and its content. These keywords should accurately describe your business and the goods or services you provide. But remember: Google will penalize your website by moving your site down in its search rankings if you use popular keywords that have nothing to do with your business.

While your website might break into the top five or ten search results on a page, Google wants people to stay on your website for more than five seconds. So if people click on your website only to find out that your site isn’t what they were expecting and doesn’t contain what they were looking for, chances are you’re using the wrong keywords.

Your brain might be swirling with keywords already, but you need to make sure that you’re on the right track by doing what’s known as keyword research. To get started, try using Google’s keyword research tool. It’s completely free because Google wants to business owners and digital marketers like you to know exactly what kind of keywords they should be using.

There are plenty of other effective SEO tools out there that you can use, like Moz or SEOProfiler, but many of them will cost your business a pretty penny, so a free resource is probably the best place to start.

Website URL

You’ll need a URL for your website and a Google account to start using the keyword planner tool. As soon as you enter your website’s URL, Google will start analyzing your content to get a sense of what your site is all about.

They’ll ask you what you want your users to do once they land on your website. You can choose from options like calling your business, visiting your storefront, or taking action directly on your website. Based on your content, Google will ask you to focus your SEO campaign on a certain geographic area based on where your target audience is located.

Product Description

Google will also ask you to define your product. The algorithm will make some suggestions based on the data from your website. You can then add images and pick your budget. Plans range from several dollars a day to thousands of dollars a month. The cost is based on how many people end up clicking on your ads. You can cancel anytime, and you don’t have to worry about running over budget.

Target Keywords

You can then choose your target keywords. Try plugging different terms into the tool to see what some of the most commonly used keywords are for your industry. But doing your research is a little more complicated than simply picking the most popular keywords. Generic keywords with a high search volume that appeal to a wide variety of businesses and geographic locations will be the toughest to crack.

As you can see in the example above, the keyword “cars for sale” gets a lot of traffic but you’ll be going up against every other car dealership in the country. Generic keywords can drain your budget because so many businesses are targeting them, but incorporating a few into your strategy will help you reach a wide audience.

More specific keywords that are less competitive are what we consider “low-hanging fruit”. These keywords tend to have a much lower search volume on Google, which means that people aren’t searching for these terms as much on Google, but your website will have a better chance of making it to the first page of results.

According to HubSpot, 50% of search queries are four words or longer, so it’s best to cast a wide net by using a combination of both high-volume and low-volume keywords. The more specific keywords will be more of a short-term goal, while those high-volume keywords can be a part of your long-term strategy.

You’ll be able to see the results once your campaign is live. If some keywords are underperforming, take them off your list. Even if you decide not to launch a campaign on AdWords, you can use their Keyword Planner to find the right keywords for your business.

Step 2: Map Out Your Content

Once you have your eye on a few keywords, it’s time to start incorporating them into the content on your website. You’ll need to focus your efforts based on the individual pages of your website:

The homepage should include a mix of all your keywords.

Other pages should feature keywords that relate directly to the topic on that page.

Location-based pages for different cities or neighborhoods should use geotargeted keywords.

Pages with individual services should feature keywords that highlight those products.

The more keywords you use per page, the more diluted your results will be, so focus on 2-3 keywords per page with 2-3 secondary terms.Click To Tweet

You can also think about adding new pages or a blog to your website, so you’ll have more real estate to work with. If you’re an e-commerce shop, don’t waste your money optimizing every single product page. There are more effective ways to spend your cash. It all depends on the structure of your business and the number of goods and services you’re trying to sell.

Generally, the more content you’re putting on your website the better. Studies have shown that:

Longer copy generates more leads, so a webpage with over 1,000 words of quality content will lead to more conversions than a webpage with just a few hundred words.Click To Tweet

Marketing Experiments conducted a series of tests which showed that long copy outperformed short copy by 40.5%. And the average first-page result on Google contains 1,890 words, as reported by Backlinko.

Step 3: Perform On-Page Optimization

SEO used to be about filling pages with a certain number of keywords, but times have changed. As Forbes illustrates…

Google doesn’t need to see more than 2-3 keywords to get a sense of what your website is about. So if you’re still obsessing over keyword density and percentages, it’s time to reevaluate your strategy.Click To Tweet

It’s best to come up with a content strategy that clearly outlines the basics of your business without being too spammy. The flow of the content should feel natural and straight to the point. If you’re hiring a content writer, focus on quality instead of keyword saturation. Everything on your website should feel like it was written by a human being, not a robot that’s been trained to target a few keywords. That’s what Google and your customers want to see.

Optimizing your website is also about squeezing keywords into what’s going on behind the page. That means you need to use keywords in your:

Title tags

Meta descriptions

Image alt text

Header tags

Those Google web crawlers are looking at a lot more than just the content on your site, so don’t forget to use a well-rounded approach when optimizing individual pages. Widely considered the best SEO resource, Google’s Search Quality Rater’s Guidelines is an in-depth guide that will help you optimize the behind-the-scenes aspects of your website.

Step 4: Build Your Backlinks

As important as on-page optimization is to any SEO strategy, there’s still a good chance that you’ll get lost in the shuffle without launching a robust backlinking strategy, also known as off-page optimization.

Backlinking, which means you have other websites linking back to your website, shows Google that your website has authority, which gives you a boost in their search rankings. Massive websites like news organizations, government agencies, and big e-commerce businesses tend to get a lot of organic backlinks, giving them an edge over smaller websites that are just getting their feet wet in terms of SEO. According to a recent report:

Links to a webpage account for 22.33% of Google’s ranking algorithm.Click To Tweet

Boosting your website’s profile with backlinks doesn’t happen overnight. You need to spend lots of time reaching out to other websites and blogs with content ideas, cross-promotional incentives, social media posts, and content syndication.

You can use websites like Just Reach Out that connect you to journalists and bloggers from all different industries. Just create an account and you can start pitching guest blog ideas to websites and digital publishers from your industry.

It’s all about building a relationship with the other players in your industry, which means you need to have quality content and a good reputation in your community. If you’re just paying other websites to link back to your site, Google will start to catch on after a while, so make sure you’re actually writing content for other publishers in order to get people to backlink to your site.

Some popular backlink strategies tend to include:

Writing guest blog posts for other websites

Interviewing some heavy hitters in your industry and offering to link back to their site

Working with other websites to invest in case studies and white papers

Submitting to directories where writers are encouraged to add content to your site

Engaging with social media influencers related to your industry

Your backlinking strategy should target a variety of websites and influencers. The more people that are linking back to your website, the more Google will recognize your website as an authority in your industry.

When it comes to auditing your off-page SEO strategy, you can use some DIY tools on the internet such as:

Just enter your website’s URL and the program will produce a checklist that tells you what areas need to be improved in order to boost your SEO rankings. You’ll get an analysis of every page, telling you how each aspect of you site measures up when it comes to important factors like internal and external link optimization and page authority.

Some SEO experts will try to tell you that doing an SEO audit every three months will help you get the most out of your strategy. But these constant audits are just a way for SEO pros to make some extra money. The truth is that you don’t need to spend a fortune on regular audits unless you’re constantly making some big changes to your site.

But don’t forget to keep up with Google’s SEO Best Practices, as the company is constantly making changes to its algorithm. If Google makes any serious changes, that’s a sign you need to invest in another audit. As HubSpot reports, 40% of marketers say the most challenging part of SEO is Google’s changing algorithms, so remember to stay informed.

Summing Up

When you’re trying to figure out how to best spend your money on SEO, focus on keyword research, generating great content, and creating a robust backlinking strategy. Google wants its users to find what they’re looking for by giving an edge to websites with meaningful content, so SEO is shifting away from technical keyword stuffing and moving towards overall quality.

Email marketing is a tried-and-true strategy for increasing conversions, and with a $38 return on investment for every dollar spent, it’s no wonder that this strategy holds fast as a mainstay component of any good marketing plan.

However, successful email marketing campaigns are built on contact lists and consumer data – increasingly regulated commodities to acquire. Come May, the collection, storage, and use of that information could put companies at risk for millions of dollars in legal penalties.

Intended to reshape the way that user data is gathered and processed, the GDPR dictates strict rules of conduct for businesses who collect information from consumers.Click To Tweet

The European Union-based regulation applies to businesses located within the EU, as well as those that target citizens or residents of the EU. On the global platform that is the digital world, few are safe from the painful penalties – along the lines of 4% of a company’s annual revenue – threatened by non-compliance of the GDPR.

The portals through which millions of bits of consumer data are passed, marketing departments are feeling the frenzy more than anyone to adjust their strategies and take cautious steps along the lines drawn by the GDPR. To avoid bank-breaking fines and lofty legal consequences, email marketers need to evaluate, update, and renovate their engagement strategies.

But how?

Here are five steps that you should take in order to tailor your email marketing strategies and avoid breaking the company bank on GDPR penalization.

Step 1: Refine the Scope of Your Data Collection

Not long ago, the go-to practice for collecting data was to cast a net and see what information could be reeled in. Marketers would index piles of user information without rhyme, reason, or discretion – but times have changed.

Email marketers will now need to implement a strategy of data minimization in which every single piece of information that is collected from users has an explicit purpose and justification.Click To Tweet

Although this may sound daunting, the adjustment is both necessary and beneficial.

Minimize Data Out of Legal Necessity

Under GDPR guidelines, data processing is only acceptable on the grounds that it can be justified as a necessary requisite to accomplish a specific goal.

Article 5 of the GDPR states that personal data can only be “collected for specified, explicit and legitimate purposes.” Those purposes are:

The vital interest of the individual

The public interest

Contractual necessity

Compliance with legal obligations

Unambiguous consent of the individual

Legitimate interest of the data controller

If your data collection doesn’t meet any of these criteria, it’s time to stop.

With GDPR penalties in the ballpark of 20 million euros, no one can afford to be careless about collecting unnecessary information.

Shed the Weight of Useless Data Targets

Gathering and storing droves of unnecessary data is a burden on your business. Now – under the pressure of the GDPR – it’s the perfect time to re-evaluate what data you’re getting your hands on and why.

According to Fulcrum Tech, most email marketers can limit the scope of their data collection to the following key points of consumer information:

Email addresses

Purchase history

Email clicks

Delivery data (# of delivered emails)

Percentage of mobile users

Leads and sales attribution channels

Website visits and clicks

Customer preferences

The bottom line is that the information you collect should be essential to the achievement of your marketing efforts and serve to enhance the customer experience. Once you’ve determined what that means for you, it’s time to get your users’ permission.

Step 2: Stop Assuming Consent

Gone are the days of obtaining customer consent with:

Pre-ticked boxes

Automatic opt-ins

Hidden options

Incentivized opt-ins

Hidden privacy policies

According toArticle 7 of the GDPR, consent to gather and use consumer data is only legally achieved through a freely given, affirmative action performed by the user. Passivity and inaction no longer cut it when it comes to customer permission.

Put simply – consent can no longer be assumed.

Not only do you need to get permission from your contacts – past, present, and future – to keep them on your contact lists, but you also need to get consent to your privacy policy. By granting consent to these, users acknowledge and accept your collection and processing of their information.

So, how do you get permission to collect the data that your email marketing campaigns rely on to succeed?

Be direct with your users and ask them to perform an explicit action that grants consent. This puts them in the driver’s seat while keeping you on the right side of the GDPR.Click To Tweet

Consent mechanisms can be installed on your website via a clickwrap modal, on a sign-up page, or in an email sent directly to your contacts.

Provoke a Response with Clickwrap

Clickwrap modals are pop-ups or full-screen windows that appear on your website and require the user to take action before continuing to access the content of your site. Use the pop-up to ask consumers if they want to receive emails from your company and provide a box to check or a button to click if they would like to offer their consent.

Maximize the effect of your clickwrap by also using it to notify your visitors of your privacy policy and provide a link to that policy. While a lot of companies choose to advertise their privacy policy through a browsewrap banner – a footer message that allows users to browse the site without acknowledging the policy – this strategy is not compliant with GDPR standards as there is no demand for affirmative consent.

Furthermore, make sure your opt-in mechanisms are specific. Instead of hitting users with a one-size-fits-all “I consent to my data being collected and used” box, present something along the lines of “I consent to receiving updates and offers” or “I acknowledge and consent to the practices outlined in the privacy policy above.” Let them know exactly to what they are granting their permission.

Sainsbury’s does clickwrap the right way by directing its visitors to their appropriate policies and asking for consent to their terms and conditions in addition to future outreach:

Notice how above the contact form there is a link to the company’s privacy policy, and below the form is an unchecked opt-in to receive emails. Walmart’s methodology here errs on the side of both compliance and customer satisfaction.

Re-engage your current email lists by sending out a one-size-fits-all permissioning email. Let your customers know that you’re amplifying your privacy measures and want to offer them control over their personal information.

Most importantly, give recipients the chance to opt in to receiving future emails – and don’t forget to leave the ‘yes’ box unchecked!

Asking users to perform this opt-in action achieves the degree of compliance that will keep your marketing efforts out of the scrutinizing eyes of the GDPR watchdogs, while trimming your audience down to an engaged base of subscribers.

Since these users are making an effort to signal that they want to receive your emails, they’re already engaging with your business. Knowing that these recipients are consenting to your efforts and not directing your emails to a spam folder can be a powerful piece of knowledge as you move forward with your marketing strategies.

Considering that “54% of marketers say increasing their engagement rate is their top email marketing priority,” what better way to kickstart that goal than by combining it with your compliance efforts?

The Guardian hit the nail on the head with a recent re-permissioning email they sent out to readers:

The Guardian takes additional steps to bolster their compliance by giving customers a date by which they need to opt in. After that, the data of users who declined to opt in will be wiped from company servers – and safe from GDPR scrutiny.

Warning! Avoid sending re-permissioning emails to users that have already unsubscribed from your newsletters. Several companies have been fined for making this mistake.

Step 4: Retool Your Old Regime

Now under the stringent reign of the GDPR, companies have to be more careful than ever about not only what information they collect and why, but how they disclose those practices to their users.

In order to optimize compliance efforts, marketers should take steps to assess and reinforce both their data stores and their privacy policy.

Perform a Data Audit

According to Techopedia, “A data audit refers to the auditing of data to assess its quality or utility for a specific purpose.” The GDPR beckons marketers to spring clean their cellars of consumer data, and toss unnecessary and non-compliant data in the trash.

Here are some dust bunnies to hunt for and sweep away for good:

Unconsenting customer contact information

Outdated emails

Campaign data that is no longer relevant

Open/click/response information not pertaining to current campaigns

Any data collected for reasons outside the four purposes outlined above

Conclusion

The looming presence of the GDPR is finally set to touch down on May 25, 2018. Whether it is a force to be reckoned with or an empty threat is yet to seen. However, the potential penalties are too great not to take your email marketing strategies in the direction of compliance.

Not only will implementing the above measures keep your business safe from GDPR backlash, but they’ll optimize your business operations and enhance your customer experience.

This has the power to help website designers make optimal choices by presenting them with information acquired from tracking user behaviors and activities. Data gives designers further insight into performance levels, enabling them to make decisions based on authentic user insights rather than unconfirmed guesses as to what is best for the prosperity of their business. Without the information provided in UX data, designers would be trying to find their way in the dark.

Since it is crucial for businesses to acquire and employ the proper types of data to maximize their UX techniques, the progress of both a website and the company as a whole relies on the use of important metrics. In order to get an in-depth understanding of what to look for when using metrics to make data-driven decisions, take a look at the following guidelines to enhance your website’s UX.

Focus on Relevance and Value to Understand Consumers

While observing analytics won’t tell you exactly why users engage with your site in certain ways, it can tell you how users are behaving. This can provide you with a wealth of insight into user experience and design performance. When analyzing consumer behavior with the use of data, all companies should focus on pinpointing the most relevant and valuable information. That information can assist them in comprehending the reasons for any noticeable trends in user’s behavior.

The objective is to get a better understanding of how consumers are behaving today as well as what their behavior will be in the future. If companies can obtain a comprehensive understanding of what their consumers are searching for, they can improve many aspects of their strategy.

Some of these aspects may include making adjustments to help deliver the optimal content or interaction at the optimal time. When done effectively, using data to understand and verify user activity patterns can allow a company to create more practical experiences, increase sales, promote brand advocacy, and craft superior marketing strategies.

The UX metrics associated with the performance of user experience include usability, engagement, and conversion, and the implications of each of these metrics in regard to determining user experience is indicated as follows:

Conversion Metrics

Conversion is by far the metric that businesses are most concerned with. Here are a few specific data metrics within the categories of interaction, usability, and conversion that you should be watching for in order to accurately track abandonment, traffic, and consumer engagement.

When trying to grasp a further understanding of what makes users more likely to convert, these are the metrics to measure:

Click Metrics

Clicks are one of the most frequently utilized, and most functional, elements to track because they are assets to almost any type of research. You can use click events to test a variety of elements such as measuring page engagement and testing call-to-action effectiveness.

This form of data is an excellent means of determining where your problem areas are and what elements of your site require further examination. For example, monitoring clicks can inform you when users are not clicking on your call-to-action buttons and can indicate when a change in site design has been effective or ineffective.

Form Data

Providing an abundance of insight into consumer behavior, form data involves:

total number of views

submissions

abandonments

field level engagements

Following submissions, views, engagement, and abandonments gives the information necessary to detect issues and formulate theories about problems, such as why users are abandoning your form. These theories can be examined and researched further with usability testing.

Search Usage and User Search Terms

Tracking search usage and user search terms can help companies conduct research for content ideas. Defining the most-searched terms in regard to specific industries and keywords can help companies detect any content recesses and make the appropriate decisions based on particular trending material.

For example, an evaluation of the top terms that consumers in the food and beverage industry are searching for indicates the top 15 trending phrases. A business in the industry can use this information by incorporating one of the trending keywords into their next blog post or article they post on their website. This increases the likelihood of traffic and further exposure.

These tools can help you acquire relevant data concerning search usage and search terms:

Site Search Usage and Terms

Google Analytics is an invaluable tool that allows automatic tracking of search usage as well as user search terms. If one of the main ways that users interact with your site is through site searches, analytical information on search data is crucial. You can use the data gained as a guiding point for progression of your site, or even your company. If you can identify the top terms searched for on your site it might lead you to identifying weaknesses in your content.

Search usage data can also reveal how well your site’s search functionality is working for users. For instance, evaluating search usage can detect trends in usability issues that decrease the chances of user conversion. If a user is less likely to convert when using the website’s site search, these metrics can allow companies to look into the issue and determine whether or not the site search is functioning optimally.

Page Scrolling

Determining how far users scroll down a website page and how you should prioritize the order of featured content and links is essential, especially when considering the amount of scrolling done on mobile devices.

Google Tag Manager is a helpful tool that can assist you with implementing the essential tags, which will then enable you to acquire scroll data for all of your website’s users. This can also provide you with great insight on how to properly organize your website’s design.

Page scroll metrics are also useful in determining any possible usability problems. This data can indicate the percentage of users who scroll past a certain point on your page, which can be due to the design of your page. In other circumstances, this might indicate a UX problem, like a portion of your page appearing to users as if there is no more content to show when that is not the case.

Final Thoughts

When designing for a more positive user experience, there’s a lot to consider. Data offers solutions to some of the considerations by helping site designers make the best choices given the information at hand. UX-driven data can be a light in the dark – designers just have to flip the switch to leverage that data and create a better, more intuitive UX.